


Norns Help Us

by i_would_live_for_tony_stark21



Category: Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Time Travel, Angst, Canon Divergence - Avengers (2012), Canon Divergence - Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Canon Divergence - Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Canon Divergence - Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Canon Divergence - Post-Iron Man 2, Canon Divergence - Pre-Thor (2011), Canon Divergence - Thor (2011), Canon Divergence - Thor: Ragnarok (2017), Canon Divergence - Thor: The Dark World, Canon-Typical Violence, Eventual Loki/Tony Stark, Feelings, Gen, Jotunn Loki (Marvel), Loki (Marvel) Feels, Loki (Marvel)-centric, Loki Posing as Odin, Odin (Marvel)'s Bad Parenting, Original Character(s), POV Loki (Marvel), POV Tony Stark, Panic Attacks, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Slow Burn, Time Travel Fix-It, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Tony Stark Needs a Hug
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-19
Updated: 2019-09-28
Packaged: 2019-10-31 11:51:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 21
Words: 29,269
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17848919
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/i_would_live_for_tony_stark21/pseuds/i_would_live_for_tony_stark21
Summary: The Norns continued existence depended on all life in the universe not being decimated and manipulated by a lesser being such as Thanos. With little time left to ensure their survival, they examine what lead to the destruction of this timeline and conclude that the singular event they need to prevent is Loki's fall. They quickly grab an empathetic mortal, who was helping survivors of the snap come to terms with their new reality, and send her back in time to Asgard right before Thor's coronation was announced. With knowledge of what lies ahead, this mortal must work to prevent Loki's fall and a series of events that culminate in the death of Fate itself.





	1. Arrival onto Asgard

Loki was lounging on a couch in his room, reading and taking notes on a book about protection spells. He glanced at the window and noticed several hours had passed since he had started his studies. He decided to stretch his legs and go for a walk around the royal gardens. 

Loki entered his mother’s favorite place in Asgard, the royal gardens. He paused to admire a fragrant pink rose when he felt a jarring magical disturbance. Physically affected by the powerful magic, he whipped around just in time to see a screaming mortal fall out of a gaping black hole in the sky. Loki called upon his battle armor with his magic and took a defensive stance. When it became apparent the mortal was going to fall to her death Loki quickly cast a spell to stop her from falling a few inches above the stone ground. The mortal continued screaming for a few seconds before realizing she had stopped falling.

Loki ended the spell and the mortal flopped onto the ground. “Thank you” she weakly offered. Loki watches as the brown skinned mortal with medium length black curly hair gracelessly struggled to stand up. 

“Who are you? Who sent you? What business do you have here?” Loki demanded. 

The mortal stared and surprised Loki by kneeling before beginning, “I am Akira Srison of Midgard. I am a doctor— “at Loki’s confused frown she corrected herself “healer?” Loki nodded. Akira continued “I am a healer of Midgard. I was sent by the Norns and I’m here to help you prevent Ragnarok. We have a lot to discuss, is there somewhere more private we could go to plan?”

It was Loki’s turn to stare as his thoughts swirled. Ragnarok was approaching?! Why would the Norns send a Midgardian? That made no sense. They flitted in and out of existence like flies. How could he and a Midgardian stop the end of the world?

He studied the mortal to gauge her intentions. The mortal appeared to be speaking truthfully and as the God of Lies, he would know. And she was the first being in a very long time to kneel to Loki and actually mean it. Loki waved his hand and his casual dark green tunic and black pants reappeared. Even if the mortal was somehow a threat, Loki could handle her easily. Mortals were fragile things. Loki gestured for her to stand up and follow. 

He headed past the hedges of roses towards the palace with Akira trailing behind him. Loki turned a corner and walked straight into Thor. Loki briefly wondered how he was going to explain the mortal and if the mortal would even want to work with him after meeting Asgard’s golden prince Thor. Thor placed two steadying hands on Loki’s shoulders and boomed “Careful brother. And, what’s this? A mortal in Asgard?”

Before Loki could even stall while he could come up with an excuse the mortal said “Prince Loki was trying out a new spell and I accidentally got brought here as a side effect. We’re going to go to his room so he can try to find out what went wrong and how to send me back. It was a very complex spell and he almost got it right. He’s a powerful magician—uh, mage. You must be so proud of him. You the great warrior and he the great mage. The Nine Realms are blessed to have you both. And it’s such an honor to meet not one but two princes of Asgard. The Norns must have willed it. You won’t tell anyone about me being here will you? Your brother will be able to figure out the spell soon but I would love to see more of Asgard.”

Loki was watching her face during the entire exchange and was impressed by how easily she lied and the effortless flattery that appeared to be working on Thor. To Loki’s disappointment, Thor stepped in between Loki and Akira. Thor attempted to lean one arm on the hedge but his hand went through. Akira stifled a laugh. Loki who had no such qualms, laughed out loud. Thor shot him a glare then turned back to Akira. “You have my word, I will not tell anyone of your presence. I can show you much more of Asgard than my brother’s rooms”, he stated while smiling and extending a hand out towards her. 

Akira smiled at Thor and Loki felt his heart drop despite expecting nothing else. But then Akira said, “Thank you, but I’d rather spend more time with Loki and see more of his magic. Magic is so awesome isn’t it?” Thor frowned and Loki’s gaze fixed on her again. 

Thor scoffed. “Magic? It is all tricks? Sparring—”

Akira interrupted. “Your hammer is magic isn’t it?” Thor looked at his hammer then back up at Akira before smiling delightedly. He launched into an often repeated story as Loki rolled his eyes, “Ah, Mjolnir. Mjolnir was forged—”

“In the core of a dying star yes. And who can wield it?”

“Those who are worthy.”

“Worthy of what? And wasn’t magic used to decide who could wield your hammer?”

Thor was taken aback by the series of interruptions and quick fire questions. He took his hammer off of his belt and examined it, lost deep in thought. He hadn’t thought of his precious Mjolnir as being a magical object. He was pulled out of his thoughts by Akira asking, “May I see?” Without thinking he handed her Mjolnir. To everyone’s surprise, Akira held the hammer and traced an inscription on the side. “Prince Loki, what does this say?”

Loki read, “Whosoever holds this hammer, if he be worthy, shall possess the power of Thor."

“Of Thor.” Akira echoed. “Not just any power, but Thor’s power. The hammer is enchanted to work for Thor or in this case Thor’s best interests”  
She handed Mjolnir back to a gobsmacked Thor and gestured to Loki to lead the way to the palace.


	2. A New Beginning

As Loki navigated the halls of the palace, a wide-eyed Akira in tow, his head spun. Thor’s hammer was just that. A hammer enchanted to only aid him. Ever since Thor had received it centuries ago, Loki had trained in fighting and studied all the magical texts he could get his hands on to prove himself worthy and be recognized as Thor’s equal by the Allfather and all of Asgard. No wonder he had never been able to lift Mjolnir, it had never been the Allfather’s intention for him to be able to wield it. It stung to know the Allfather did not see him as “worthy” but it was freeing as well. There wasn’t anything wrong with him he had simply been judging himself on the wrong scale. 

And now this mortal, clearly blessed by the Norns, claimed he was involved in preventing Ragnarok. Maybe, he would finally be seen outside of Thor’s shadow. Loki instead of Thor as Asgard’s savior. Loki had never heard of the Norns interfering so directly with a mortal but he guessed whatever catastrophe happened in the future justified the means of preventing it. And shockingly, Akira, one of the few beings favored by the Norns, respected him when all of Asgard did not. He observed her as they walked down the hall to his rooms. She was turning her head in every direction trying to look at everything in the palace all at once, a look of awe on her face. She looked so ordinary and yet she had held Thor’s hammer, cleverly using some loophole in the enchantment. And she had stood up to Thor, a great feat not many beings in the Nine Realms could claim. 

As Loki shut the door to his rooms, Akira went over to the couch he had been studying on earlier and looked at the texts he had been studying. Loki took a seat and gestured for her to do the same. 

Akira spoke, “Do you have any questions before we begin?”

He inquired, “What did the Norns say? Why did they choose you? When is Ragnarok?” 

She took a deep breath and began, “I am from a future where half of all living things in the universe are decimated by a being named Thanos”. Loki reared back as if he had been struck. “I was helping the survivors deal with their loss in the aftermath. One day, I went to sleep and woke up on a floating rock in space with the Norns. They were dying, they kept flickering in and out of existence. They were working on this beautiful tapestry but the bottom of it was scorched and torn irreparably. The Norns said that was the tapestry of all life in the Universe and that the end of everything was near. They said that the future of all life was threatened and they were sending me as a last ditch effort to prevent the end of everything. I don’t know why they sent me. They asked me if I wanted to ease the suffering of the living and save innumerable lives in the process. I agreed of course, so they gave me their knowledge of everything related to the end of the nine realms and tied my string of Fate to a point in your past. They said you were the key to it all. Ragnarok is about 5-6 years from now but we are also trying to prevent some other destructive events that lead to the end of everything as we know it. Any more questions?”

Loki stared, at a loss for how to feel and what to say. His head was pounding and he felt panic bubbling up his chest and into his throat. Akira noticed and enveloped him in a hug. She patted his back and encouraged him to breathe in and out to match her breaths. There was nothing ordinary about this mortal. She had a strength beyond her years and the frailty of her species. Confronted with the end of everything, she remained unwavering and was comforting him! A being that had limited knowledge of the universe and no knowledge of deities like the Norns was stoically trying to save them all. Loki decided in that moment, that he would do everything in his power to help her. He would help her save all of life and Fate itself. His magic enveloped the both of them. Akira gasped in surprise at the green in the air and grabbed at it as it dissipated.

“I’m alright”, Loki admitted weakly, pulling away from the embrace. “How are you handling all of this?”

“Well I’ve gotten this far in life haven’t I? I’ve been fine so far even though I’ve been through many challenges and I guess the future has to be the same. We have to be fine. This will just be a very tough time, looking back. It’s downright terrifying in the present, sure, but we have to persist. Besides if there’s any chance we can fuck Thanos over and save everyone, I have to take it and give it my best”, she replied. 

“Indeed, let’s get started then.”


	3. Revelations

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oops I didn't edit chapter 3 before posting. fixed a typo and edited a paragraph 3/16

“I have a plan but I want us to be equals in decision making. We’re going to have to be a team in order to even have a chance of preventing everything that’s coming. I’m not going to be able to tell you everything at once but I’ll tell you all the relevant information the closer we are to something big. I know it’s a lot to ask, but do you trust me?” Akira asked. 

Loki paused to consider. Surprisingly, he did trust her but it was never good to be in the dark. 

As if reading his thoughts, Akira conceded, “I know if I was in your position I’d want all the information too and that it would be super hard to trust a stranger. But there are events that are already in motion that we need to work on addressing, it would take too long to go through everything that’s going to happen right now. Just know that everything I do will be in our best interests. If you want to make that statement magically binding, go for it. I need an ally I can rely on.”

Loki nodded. “We could have a magical agreement to not betray each other, to never do anything directly or indirectly to cause physical harm, and to have good intentions towards each other for everything we do.”

As he spoke, green magic swirled around the room. Akira looked on in awe, mouth slightly ajar as the green magic settled on Loki and herself. She smiled then began, 

“Okay, one of our long term goals is to get as many allies as we can. Thanos is able to overwhelm Asgard, Midgard, and everywhere else so easily because there isn’t that much collaboration and communication. It can’t hurt to start forging alliances. Thanos is able to get his powers from these powerful artifacts called infinity stones.” 

Loki’s eyes widened. He had come across texts describing stones of infinite power formed at the creation of the universe, but they were thought to be legends and lost forever.

“They are currently scattered around the universe so the more allies we have everywhere, the better off we’ll be when they turn up. Do you have any suggestions for who we should ally with? The Norns gave me a very narrow range of knowledge of events and context to prevent the end of the universe.”

“As much as I loathe to admit it, having Heimdall’s eyes and the Allfather’s guidance would be useful. After all, he did negotiate peace with the nine realms.” 

Akira winced at that statement. Loki noted it and continued, “Mother is also a greatly powerful mage who has strong ties to Vanaheimr, a world of mages. My brother Thor, fool that he is, is a mighty warrior. As for the nine realms, Nilfheim is a dead realm that contains Helheim, Queen Hel’s domain. She commands the non-warrior dead there and could be a useful ally to have. Svartalheim is home to the dwarves who are great weapon smiths. Alfheim is home of the light elves. There is Midgard of course.” 

Akira nodded in agreement, “There are some Midgardians and other beings we can work with. What about the other realms?”

“Jotunheim is a frozen wasteland filled with savage ice giants. They are monsters and they only understand violence. It took all of the Allfather’s strength to defeat them during the War. Musphelheim is filled with fire giants and dragons that hate us. They cannot be reasoned with. Besides, isn’t Surtur putting his crown into the eternal flame what causes Ragnarok?” Loki inquired, looking pointedly at Akira.

“I mean technically. Turns out, you and Thor have an elder sister and destroying Asgard, the source of her power, was the only way to keep her from killing everything indiscriminately”

“We have a sister?” Loki asked with alarm in his voice. “Well if she is as bloodthirsty as you say, we must warn Odin and Heim—”

Akira interrupted firmly, “Heimdall does not see all. I’m here and he hasn’t noticed because the Norns are greatly more powerful than Heimdall. There’s also an invasion in a few years that he does not see. Heimdall is a glorified figurehead. He is loyal to Odin so he was given the ability to see only everything Odin wants him to.” Her voice gradually rose, “And rest assured, Odin knows about the threat she poses. Hela is fully her father’s daughter. Odin didn’t negotiate peace among the nine realms. He conquered and destroyed them. He is a victor and victors write history.” 

Loki was at a loss for words for the second time in a day. He disliked not having the upper hand in information and having his world view shifted yet again by this surprising mortal. But he supposed it was better than the alternative. Knowledge was power and it was good that Akira, his ally, had so much of it. And unbeknownst to Heimdall, and Akira too it appeared, Loki was capable of walking hidden paths on Yggdrasil and slipping unseen from world to world. Odin was a warrior king, praised for his prowess on the battlefield. Akira was right, Odin had devastated two realms, Musphelheim and Jotunheim. Loki was well versed in history and politics. It was not outside the realm of logic that he could have conquered or forced the others to surrender as well. Akira provided an outside perspective and made him question things he had previously accepted as fact, such as worthiness being the only factor in picking up Mjolnir, a hammer gifted by the Allfather, a powerful mage, to his favorite son. 

“I know this might be hard for you to accept or even consider but Odin is flawed.”

Loki disagreed. It was refreshing to hear someone not sing praises for Odin. It made him feel less alone. Some days he felt he was the only one in this realm to not blindly follow the majority like sheep. It was exhilarating to start to realize that Odin’s word was not absolute as he had always believed it to be. He would make an effort to question and investigate what Odin had presented to him as fact. 

Loki allowed himself a small smile, “It is jarring to hear him critiqued so vehemently but I know there is truth to your words. I can travel between worlds without Heimdall or Odin’s knowledge.”

“Excellent, that will definitely help us! We can wait till you’re in power to create alliances with the worlds Asgard is at peace with. But in the meantime, why don’t we go to Jotunheim and try to forge an alliance with them?”

Loki reared back as if struck, his voice acerbic, “Jotunheim? Why there? Did you not hear me when I said it was a barren world full of mindless beasts? Why not Helheim?”

Akira calmly asked, “How do you know they are mindless? Have you been to Jotunheim?”

Loki replied angrily, “I have not been but they attacked Midgard! How can you defend them?”

“You’re right, I didn’t know that they attacked Midgard, but if I judged everyone on who they attacked, I wouldn’t be trying to save anyone.”

“There are texts upon texts in Asgard’s royal library detailing their heinous acts. They are the monsters parents tell their children about at night. You yourself said you have a limited scope of the Norn’s knowledge, how can you presume to know anything about the frost giants?”

“Midgard attacks Midgard constantly but everyone does not deserve to die for it. On Midgard, during times of war, we have something called propaganda. One side makes lies about the other side to justify killing them and motivate people to support the war. They vilify the enemy and these lies become the scary stories parents tell their children about at night. All you’ve told me about Jotunheim are stories. Asgardian texts in Odin’s library. The childhood stories of loyal, ignorant Asgardian citizens. Do you get what I’m saying?”

Loki’s eyes widened in understanding. He had never thought to question his admittedly little knowledge of Asgard’s enemies. He had thought Odin was a benevolent and just king. He did not think his father was capable of lying about an entire planet to another entire planet. Loki was slowly finding out that was not the case. He didn’t know what to think of the frost or ice giants, but he was willing to go research them directly in order to form his own opinions of them. 

Loki held up his hands placatingly then asked, “Asgardians and Jotuns are sworn enemies, do you really think they would be willing to ally with us?” 

“Three words. Mutually assured destruction. If we don’t forge alliances, we’ll both be obliterated by Thanos. We have to at least try. ”

Loki conceded, “We will venture to Jotunheim at first light tomorrow. I would like to learn about the Jotuns and what else my father has lied about. However, I still do not understand why we are going there first?” Loki thought Akira had been very passionate in her diatribe against Odin and her defense of the Jotuns. Yet she failed to mention Musphelheim and its denizens. Loki wondered, what lay on Jotunheim that was so important to the end of all time.

Patient up to this point, Akira exhaled loudly and looked to the ceiling. She muttered under her breath, “God, no Norns. Norns help us all.”

Loki offered, “Perhaps we should take a break.” He turned to the window to see night had fallen. 

Akira leaned back onto the couch and replied, “That’s a great idea. But I’ll answer your question, we are in this together and you deserve to know everything I know. We’re doing Jotunheim first to not arouse Odin’s suspicions. It would be too visible to ally with other realms right now while he is still firmly in power. We do not need his interference, he is a fool but a powerful fool. Besides he will fall into the Odinsleep soon.” 

She anxiously ran her hands through her hair and continued, “There’s just so much I need to tell you and that we have to do. The sheer amount of shit we have to pull off is overwhelming. And I have no idea what I’m doing, I’m making this shit up as it goes. If anything goes wrong, it’s on me—”

Loki laid a reassuring hand on her shoulder, “You’re doing admirably. A lesser being would have succumbed to the pressure ages ago. And we’re in this together. We still have time do we not? The end of the world is not tomorrow. ” He squeezed her shoulder and stood up. “Come let us get food as you tell me more, my fountain of knowledge.”

“That is a terrible nickname, don’t ever call me that again” Akira replied laughing to Loki, who was holding back a barely concealed smile. They strode out the doors of Loki’s chambers and into the cool night time air of the palace’s hallways.

“My mortal not of Midgard but of the Norns”

“That’s even worse, please stop.”

“Nornling”

“Noooo” she groaned. 

They arrived at the kitchens where Loki asked the cooks for a large platter containing a variety of Asgardian foods. 

On the way back, Akira giggles, “My marvelous metal-tongued mage.”

“That’s an apt description.”

“You are shameless. I’m going to find a nickname you hate.”

“You can try.”

“Kingling.”

Loki suddenly remembered at the beginning of his outburst, she had mentioned that he would be in power. He can’t help it, he grins ear to ear and asks, “Do I get crowned king? Does Odin finally see that Thor is not ready for the crown yet?” 

Akira smiles and bumps into his arm affectionately. “Thor’s coronation is in a few weeks. But he is never king. You are and will be a much better king than Thor could ever be and than Odin ever was.”

Loki smiled and bumped her back. Even if it was the end of the world that had brought them together, he was glad to have met this mortal who made him feel better about himself despite knowing him for less than a day. A feat his friends, or rather Thor’s friends, were not capable of doing so despite the thousands of years of companionship and many adventures between them. He knew Thor loved him of course but Thor was naively oblivious to how Loki never quite fit into Asgard. Akira took Asgard and turned it onto its head. She questioned why Asgard didn’t fit him and made him feel more accepted than he had in years.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guess who wrote this instead of doing any of her work? I have research and anatomy and lectures to go through and clinic an hour away tomorrow morning but no regrets because it was so therapeutic writing this.


	4. Journey to Jotunheim

At first light, Loki quickly woke up and started mentally planning the journey. Needless to say, they couldn’t use the Bifrost because they were avoiding Heimdal’s view. He opened his curtains and Akira groaned from his couch. He chuckled and threw her winter clothing. She groaned again and reluctantly put it on. He also started donning warm clothing and tucking in easily reachable weapons into his clothing. He was open minded not stupid. And just because he was willing to have a blank slate on his beliefs about the Jotuns, the Jotuns wouldn’t likely share such considerate views towards their conquerors. He frowned and turned to the mortal. His mortal. How the hell was he supposed to keep her safe from the Jotun when she couldn’t even survive Jotunheim’s climate unaided. Akira was now seated upright wearing a parka with the hood on, head slumped over and clearly asleep. Loki started casting warming spells and protective spells to make sure she could survive the weather with and without the jacket. He also cast a complicated spell to ensure he could always instantaneously send her back to the safety of Asgard if things were to go south. 

As he completed the spell, she suddenly started awake. She looked at him, as if understanding he had performed a silent spell despite not seeing the green of his magic. Yawning, she stood up and asked, “For the weather?”

He nodded and transported them to close to the Bifrost site on Jotunheim. The wind was howling and blowing snow into their faces. He started trudging through the several feet of snow, Akira trailing further and further behind him. He turned back and noticed Akira was having a hard time, her teeth chattering in the cold and her feet sinking with each step she took. Loki layered more heating spells on the parts of her exposed to the elements and enchanted her boots to make her lighter. He was cold but not uncomfortably so with his clothing. He had always run cold and been to first to overheat on his quests with Thor and the Warriors Three. And he supposed he was just more experienced at walking on snow to avoid getting stuck. She caught up and they ventured forward into the snowy, hilly landscape towards some mountains. About half an hour in, Akira wanted to rest, complaining nonsensically about not signing up for hiking and if the Jotuns could please just show up that would be fanfuckingtastic. Loki used his magic to fashion a place to sit out of snow. As soon as Akira sat flush against him, five blue giants quickly emerged from the snowy hills itself. Loki jumped up summoning a sword and standing in front of Akira. The giants surrounded them and sharp ice blades grew out of their hands. But they stopped and didn’t get any closer. Akira elbowed him and he glared back at her. He was only trying to protect her. 

“Put away the sword” she hissed. “We come in peace” she shouted loudly for the ice giants to hear above the wind. One of the giants behind them laughed and they turned around to see him. “Such a small mortal with a loud voice. Does she speak for you as well Asgardian?” 

Loki looked to Akira, put away his sword and nodded. 

The leader of the giants continued, “Even if you did not come in peace, you know not what your actions would unleash. I do. Jotunheim never recovered from the war. Your father destroyed our numbers and our land. Any aggression against you would lead to a conflict that would wipe the remaining of us out. You should leave now, Asgardian”. 

“Wait! We have a proposition. Odin doesn’t know we’re here. We mean no harm.” Akira pleaded.

“I said nothing about you, child. You are not of this world yet you are imbued with ancient magics. We have been watching you since you came to this realm and know you are not capable of harming us. We simply wish to avoid conflict with a prince of Asgard. How long will it take for Odin to notice his son is missing?”

She stepped closer to Loki and said, “He is my ally. He goes where I go. Loki has also made preparations. He has shielded himself from Odin’s gaze and the Norns have shielded me from his gaze as well. The Norns sent us to prevent the end of all the realms”

The giants gasped and began rapidly conversing amongst themselves about the Norns. The leader closed his eyes and raised his hands. White magic swirled around them and Loki grabbed Akira ready to teleport, but the leader opened his eyes and spoke as the magic dissipated as quickly as it appeared, “She speaks the truth. She was sent by the Norns”. 

He continued, “Come let us go inside to discuss. It would be foolish to not heed the Norns warning us about the end of the worlds. We will help you with whatever you need.”

Without thinking Loki blurted out, “Inside?”

“We live in the caves. Surely you don’t think the Jotun live outside in the snow? Just because we can tolerate the cold doesn’t mean we enjoy the low temperatures the winter brings.” The giant gave him a pointed look. “Yes, we have seasons as well”. 

Face burning in embarrassment, Loki nodded. He had never felt so ignorant and stupid in his life. He made it a point to extensively research anywhere new he traveled to so he could equal or have the upper hand in knowledge. The leader scooped Akira up and she yelped. He placed her in a piggy back position and ventured forward at a dizzying pace. Loki followed and exerted himself to keep up. 

They soon reached the base of the mountains. One of the other giants touched the ice on the base and dragged his hand across. The ice melted away to reveal a tall and extensive cave. They went inside. This time both Akira and Loki were looking in all directions at once. The sides of the cave were lit with glowing crystals. They went down a long hallway and into a vast common area with many other Jotun. Crystals littered the ceiling and gave it a bright, airy ethereal lighting. Jotuns of various heights stared at them and pointed, clearly talking about them. The giant carrying Akira stopped one of the passing Jotun and demanded, “Tell Helblindi to meet us in the library, it’s urgent”. 

They stepped into a quiet room filled to the 20 foot ceiling with rows and rows of books. Asgard’s library paled in comparison to this one. They all sat around a table made of ice on benches of snow. The giant leader gently placed Akira directly on the table and made her a seat of snow on the table to sit on. Loki hoisted himself up onto the snow bench unaided and added snow to the bench so he could sit comfortably at a comparable height to the giants. The leader looked meaningfully at Loki but said nothing. Another frost giant entered the room and paused, taking in the sight of the Midgardian and Asgardian. He sat at the last seat at the table on the other side of Loki and began, “So, have we done introductions already or…?”

The leader shook his head no and introduced himself, “I am King Laufey of Jotunheim.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Since someone brought up that the Jotun don't live in caves in canon and have buildings and such, this is canon divergent though I try to stick to cannon as much as possible. This is a Jotunheim where after the war, the Jotun decided that having buildings out in the open isn't the wisest. The caves offer more defenses/ they didn't have the power to rebuild without the Casket.


	5. History of Jotunheim

Loki was startled to say the least. All the frost giants looked the same to him. Apparently, Akira thought the same too. She gasped in surprise and attempted to bow before thinking better of it and kneeling. She addressed the Jotun, “King Laufey we are honored to meet you. I am Akira of Midgard and messenger of the Norns. And obviously you know Prince Loki of Asgard and ally of the Norns”. 

The rest of the room went around introducing themselves as various dignitaries, warriors, and surprisingly a few mages. Akira then recounted what lay in the future and asked for an alliance. They then took turns answering the Jotuns’ questions. 

“What do you need first?” King Laufey inquired. 

“I’d like to know more about the Jotun. Your capabilities, battle skills, alliances… things of that nature. I’d also like to know more about the War between Asgard and Jotunheim. I am trying to create a coalition of allies to work against the threat. Eventually Jotuns and Asgardians would need to work together. I’d like to try to facilitate that but I don’t have all of the information.”

“All of us can manipulate ice and snow and we have comparable physical strength to the Asgardians. We used to all be adept at magic, but Odin bound all of our magic in the Casket of Ancient Winters when he defeated us. Some of our extremely skilled mages still have some access to our powers but there are very few of us that survived the war. Outside of Jotunheim, we are not as strong or skilled at battle because Odin stole our powers. We can gather up all the different tribes of Jotunheim for a larger battle but that will take time.”

Loki listened in rapt attention. An entire race of beings with innate magical ability. In Asgard, only he, Odin, and Frigga were able to wield magic and Frigga was Vanir. Stripping a mage of his magic, let alone an entire magical species of magic, was unthinkable. “There are different tribes?” Loki interrupted.

“Yes, there is much of Jotunheim and the nine realms you don’t know about, Odinson. The tribes had to unite to save our realm when Odin ravaged our lands with his army. As leader of the tribe closest to the invasion, I became tasked with leading the united tribes. Do you even know why your father is the ruler of the nine realms? He conquered each and every one of them. Stealing their resources for his realm or forging stifling contracts that cripple their economies. He stole our magic and the magic of the land because we were the closest at winning against his reign of terror. And for that we were vilified in his empire, and our planet destroyed. Jotunheim was not always a barren wasteland. We had farmers, hunters, craftsmen but Odin came and uprooted our magic and stored it in an artifact. A box that sits on display in his vault”. Turning to Akira, the king continued, “We will not be of much help without the casket. What exactly did the Norns say? Who will be causing the end of the world?”

Loki half paid attention as Akira explained the threat of Thanos again. Surprisingly, or unsurprisingly, he honestly didn’t know anything anymore, the Jotuns were familiar with the infinity stones as well. He tuned out the conversation as his mind whirred, the beginnings of a plan to steal the Casket back for the Jotuns without being noticed emerging. What Odin was done was unfair and he was determined to give the mages back their power, especially if it helped against Thanos. He did not want to start an interplanetary conflict. That was Thor’s job. 

As if reading his mind, Akira’s next question brought him out of his thoughts. “What are your thoughts on Thor?” Akira asked.

“War-mongering fool” replied one of the younger Jotuns. Helblindi, if Loki remembered his name correctly. Loki chuckled at the apt description and received a civilized nod for his efforts. 

“What if I were to tell you Odin was announcing his coronation later this week?”

Murmurs erupted around the room as Loki’s jaw dropped. Just yesterday, Akira had told him the coronation would happen in a few weeks. Loki knew his brother wasn’t ready for the throne. He would plunge the nine realms into chaos by inadvertently declaring a war on a quest or simply because he had never actually applied the negotiation skills that were drilled into their heads as children. Loki was not jealous. He did not envy those who held the responsibilities of the crown but he simply knew Thor wasn’t ready for it. Thor was too headstrong and hot-headed. Less than a week! He wouldn’t even have time to come up with a well-thought-out plot to reveal Thor’s unworthiness to Odin. Loki shot a glare at Akira that was ignored. Interesting, she had a plan. 

“What if we could get the Casket of Ancient Winters back and remove Thor from the throne in one fell swoop?”


	6. Blue Ascending

Helblindi laughed without restraint, his smile all teeth. They spent the rest of the day discussing the details of the plan to reclaim the casket and prove Thor’s unworthiness for the throne. After they finished discussing, they dined and followed Helblindi to his rooms to stay overnight. Loki never thought he would spend a night in Jotunheim, let alone in the rooms of a Jotun prince. The next morning, he and Helblindi worked to create a two way communication spell and transportation spells necessary for retrieving the casket while Akira spent time with the King. It was invigorating to work with another mage and absolutely fascinating to learn about Jotun magic. Helblindi even gave him a few books from his personal library for Loki to borrow and read. As much as he wanted to stay longer and collaborate on magic and learn more about the neighboring world, it was time to return to avoid suspicion and set their plan into action. When they were saying their goodbyes, Akira reached out to embrace Helblindi. Loki exclaimed in alarm which then turned to puzzlement as everybody turned to look at him in concern. 

“She’s not wearing gloves, her skin is exposed, it will freeze…” he trailed off. Akira made it a point to touch Helblindi’s hand with her own and gesture sarcastically. 

“I do hope you can continue to return to Jotunheim to work with us, Loki. There is much you could learn” Laufey said, not unkindly.

Helblindi continued, “We only freeze enemies on the battle field. It is magic as well. Our skin doesn’t simply cause frostbite in anyone we touch. We can control it. Do you want to try for yourself?” Helblindi offered, outstretching his hand.

Loki hesitated but after seeing Akira nod, shook hands with Helblindi. He smiled when he felt no pain but Helbindi cried in alarm and quickly let his hand go as if burned. Loki looked down at his hand and saw that his skin was blue and that the blue was rising up his forearm. 

“Father, I did not mean to hurt him” Helblindi exclaimed in distress. 

“Watch he isn’t in pain. It seems like a complex spell is being unwoven”, King Laufey said in a conciliatory tone while intently watching Loki’s changes. 

Loki closed his eyes and focused inward on his magic drowning out the conversation. He felt something slightly external being unwoven. Like King Laufey had assessed, the spell had many threads. Realization suddenly slammed into him. It was a glamor being removed. Eyes opening in shock, he noticed that both hands were blue. He ran up to an ice wall and saw two striking red eyes within a blue Jotun face starting back at him. He had two small horns atop his head, shockingly similar to his battle helmet. He traced white ridges upon his face and was shocked to find that he could now suddenly see distinct white ridges on Helblindi and King Laufey’s faces as well. 

Before he could even begin to process what had happened, Laufey let out a choked sob and fell to his knees. Helblindi rushed to his father but kept looking between his father and Loki in bewilderment, seemingly unsure of who needed more comforting. Akira stepped toward him and squeezed both of his hands. She explained, “Odin and Frigga are not your birth parents. Odin found you during the war with the Jotuns and took you. He cast a glamor on you as a baby so you would appear Asgardian. Your biological father is—” 

“Me”. Laufey choked out in a broken voice.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> shorter chapter but a faster update than in the past. haha, I am behind in like 3 different aspects of school.


	7. Betrayal

Loki was shaken to his core. He sank to his knees and ignored the concerned voices trying to get his attention. He considered transporting away from Jotunheim to be alone but when he tried to summon his magic it felt different and that shocked him enough into not completing the spell. He stared at his hands in wonder as an earthier ice blue magic flowed in the air with the power of an ocean. King Laufey took his hand and held it, sending calmness via his magic. Laufey transported all of them to his rooms and settled him into a bench, carefully draping blankets on him. Akira sat next to him and held his hand, giving him a reassuring squeeze. Laufey sat directly in front of him while Helblindi hovered uncertainly behind his father. Their father. Fathers. 

His heart felt like it was being shredded. He absentmindedly thought that Odin’s betrayal hurt much worse than being frozen by a Jotun could ever hurt. It felt like thousands of shards of ice were pushing through his very being, making his soul bleed profusely. He doubted he would ever recover. How could Odin have raised him on Asgard and not told him his heritage? Comparing him to Asgardians and forcing to compete against Thor in competitions he wasn’t ever expected to win. Truly, without his magic, he would have never been able to parallel Thor in battle and on quests. How could Odin have fed him lies about Jotuns when he was a Jotun himself? And not just any Jotun but a prince of Jotunheim. How could Odin have never told him and raised him as a son? It was far too cruel. He guessed he was never truly a son of Odin. He wondered if Hela, his supposed sister, was not Asgardian either. He no longer trusted anything Odin did. A hand on his face startled him out of his thoughts and to his surprise he felt warm wet tears cascading down his face. Laufey brushed his tears away and he became aware of the calming magic enveloping his own. Laufey’s and Helblindi’s no doubt. He looked at Helblindi. He had a brother. Brothers?

Questions poured from his grievously injured core. Why? Did Thor know? He couldn’t have known, he wasn’t capable of keeping a secret. Why? Did his mother know? Why would Odin do this? Did Heimdall know? It would certainly explain the gatekeeper's barely hidden prejudice against him. He looked up at Laufey. Laufey certainly didn’t know, judging by his interactions with Loki. Laufey embraced him and Loki sobbed uncontrollably into his shoulder. Could Odin have stolen him to break Laufey’s spirit and force the Jotuns to surrender? He saw Laufey and Helblindi casting a spell and fell asleep to Akira covering him with the blankets as he laid down. As he drifted off, he entertained an even darker, more twisted thought. Could Odin have stolen a royal Jotun to raise as his own to have loyal sons on the thrones of Asgard and Jotunheim respectively?

When he woke up his soul still felt raw, but he felt marginally better. Akira was holding his hand and was asleep on the floor by his bench. He noticed his hands were pale white, the glamor pervading once again. Instead of feeling the comforting light touch he thought was his own essence, the glamor felt like Odin and weighed down heavily on him. He lifted his head up and heard Laufey and Helblindi speaking in low voices. They turned to him and Helblindi gave him a cup of tea. Akira stirred and sat next to him, simply holding him as he drank his tea. As if turning back time, he felt the emotions inundating his mind recede. He was aware of them and they were still painful, but he was able to think more logically. 

Laufey started speaking. “The tea has herbs to help process heartbreak healthily. My son we thought you were dead. We mourned you. We still mourn you. During the war, you were kept in the holiest temple. We never imagined that Odin would be so monstrous as to attack the temple, slaughter all the priests, and steal you away from us. We thought you were dead. If we had known you were alive, we would have searched and gotten you back. It is even crueler that Odin hid you and raised you in plain sight as a prince of Asgard let alone an Asgardian prince. I cannot imagine what growing up there was like. And I can’t even fathom what must be going through your mind right now. I apologize for not being there for you, looking for you when you were kidnapped, that I wasn’t there for you all these years when you lived in Asgard…” 

Overcome by emotion, Laufey paused and wiped away the tears freely flowing down his face. “Loptr, Loki, we are here for you now. I, Helblindi, and your other younger brother Byleistr all would love to get to know you. Everyone here will want to know you as well. You are the rightful prince of Jotunheim. Any information or knowledge you seek shall be given freely. The library is open to you. The most skilled mages can teach you how to hone your ice magic. Anything you desire is yours. We are here to support and love you. Just let us know what you need. You can stay as long as you’d like and visit as often as you want.” 

Loki embraced Laufey and softly cried. The rest of the day was an out of body experience. He remembered asking about his kidnapping and being shown the ruins of the obliterated temple from where he was stolen. He was introduced to his other brother Byleistr. He learned about his birth mother and how she was a fierce warrior that died during the war. 

The next day he woke up with the emotional equivalent of the hangover he had when Thor was first given Mjolnir. Without the effect of the tea, he had to regulate his emotions himself but he think he managed well. Time was definitely helping, and it was nice to be as appreciated and loved as he was by this family. He also resolved to confront Odin and Queen Frigga. Loki definitely wanted to spend more time getting to know them and Jotunheim but he remembered that dethroning Thor and restoring power to the Jotun was necessary to prevent the end of life. He would be able to know more about his heritage only if life continued. Speaking of which, he sat up off the couch and scanned Helblindi’s room for Akira. 

He was gobsmacked to find Akira sitting on Helblindi’s lap. He had a fleeting thought, “Why would anyone of a different species choose to get romantically involved with a Jotun?” which was quickly replaced by “I’m a Jotun.” There was an almost comical difference in their heights. He watched them kiss. Maybe, there was hope for him yet. He cleared his throat and the couple finally separated. 

They both approached him and fussed about him, Laufey making an appearance a few minutes later. Loki let them, then shared his decision to go back to Asgard to carry out the plan they had worked on. He promised to return to Jotunheim and they returned to Loki’s chambers on Asgard. 

When they were finally alone, he confronted Akira. “You knew didn’t you.” She nodded. Fuming, he transported out of the room to start preparations for the plan and catch up on what had transpired on Asgard while he had been away. As the day passed, he had time to reflect. Their magical contract hadn’t torn her to shreds, so she had good intentions in letting events play out organically and didn’t actually harm or betray him. Even though it stung to be kept in the dark, he recognized that he wouldn’t have taken his Jotun heritage as well as he did if he hadn’t spent the day having his understanding of them turned upside down and creating spells with one of its princes. Truth being told, if he had been alone, he would have transported right back to Asgard and confronted Odin right then and there with no plan or thought of the consequences. 

He wondered why the Norns shared his heritage with Akira and how it was relevant to the end of the world. Loki knew it was better to know than to remain ignorant but the timing of it nearly prevented them from executing their plan. He suddenly realized too that if he hadn’t known at all, he probably could have been easily manipulated by anyone that did know. Feeling guilty about storming out earlier, he returned to his chambers to find Akira writing pages upon pages of paragraphs, bullet points, and diagrams. 

As soon as she saw him, Akira jumped up and rushed over. “I’m sorry for not telling you but I don’t think you would have believed me and we do need more allies. I’m sorry if I hurt you—are you doing okay?—It’s okay to not be okay. Did you talk to Odin—”

He held up a hand, causing her to stop rambling. “It’s okay. I think you did the best you could and you were there for me the entire time. I didn’t talk to anyone, I spent the day preparing.”

“Oh good” Akira exclaimed in relief, throwing her arms around him. He returned the hug and held her longer than he would have normally. He trusted her. 

“What are you working on?” And just like that, they were back to normal. Akira explained that she was making a timeline of future events and things they needed to do. Well into the night, Akira kept working as Loki read what she had written and double checked that everything was in place for the coronation. 

When they finally decided to call it a night, Loki asked in the dark. “Why is my Jotun heritage relevant when we’re dealing with the end?”

“You’re a powerful and fierce defender of Asgard. When the other Loki learned about your heritage under less than ideal circumstances, it compromised him. He was the only competent being protecting Asgard so when he was out of the picture Asgard was attacked twice and fell. “

He remained silent, mulling over the implications of what Akira just said. 

Sometime later, Akira spoke again. “The Norns didn’t just give me a limited amount of their knowledge to stop the end of the world. They also gave me the other Loki’s knowledge and perspective.”


	8. Healing

“Of course you do”, Loki replied exasperatedly. “I know you have a lot on your mind but is there anything else relevant to my life you’d like to share? You don’t mean to hurt me and I trust you but I dislike my life imploding in surprising new ways every time you decide to move your plan forward. ”

“I’ll tell you but it’s just going to be distressing and confusing without any context. Maybe, one day once we’ve defeated Thanos I’ll tell you everything that happened to the other Loki.” Loki heard her shuffling in the dark and she sat at the foot of his bed. “Your mother died when the Dark Elves invaded. You always blamed yourself for her death. She knew you were Jotun and she regretted never telling you. Odin’s death is what released Hela. It took all the Valkyrie being slaughtered to imprison her the last time. Odin decided to change from a conqueror to a benevolent king and when she didn’t fall in line, she was imprisoned for crossing him. Thanos— ”

Thor burst into his room with great urgency, booming “LOKI, HAVE YOU HEARD?! MY CORONATION IS TOMORROW”. Thor, drunk fool he was, managed to overwhelm the waning wards on his room, causing the dissipating magic to sweep through the room, scattering the neatly arranged piles of papers everywhere. Akira startled and fell off the bed as Thor tripped over a chair and lay on the floor. Loki had never wanted to strangle Thor more in his life. He cast a quick spell to hide the papers and shut the doors before the guards could find them. 

“Get up you big buffoon, yes I’ve heard. Congratulations. I see you’ve started celebrating early.” 

Melancholy expression on his face, Thor continued slurring slightly, “I couldn’t find you. Wherewereyou? I can’t do this without you brother. You’ve always been better at fulfilling out duties. I know nothing of magic. Even that mortal did! Oh, she’s still here. I’m glad you’ve found a companion Loki.” Thor struggled to sit upright and placed his hands on Loki’s shoulders. “Loki, there’s no one else I’d rather have by my side as king. Will you be my advisor?”

Face softening, Loki agreed. Thor exuberantly smiled and squeezed him in a rib crushing hug. Loki could smell the mead on Thor’s breath on every exhale, he wouldn’t remember much of this conversation tomorrow. As unwittingly oblivious and careless Thor was, he truly cared about Loki. There was no way he could have known about Loki being Jotun. Everybody else on Asgard would consider him a monster if they knew what he really was. But Loki dared to hope that Thor wouldn’t. Swallowing deeply with emotion, Loki asked, “Brother, would you still want me as your advisor even if I wasn’t what I seemed?”

Thor gave him a confused look. “Like when you turned into a snake?”

Loki smiled sadly. “Not quite. Like say if I was a mortal.” He said, gesturing at Akira. “If I wasn’t really your brother.” 

Giving him a concerned look, Thor replied while trying to feel his forehead for a fever and missing completely. “You’re not making any sense. You’re my brother. I’d give you a golden apple if you were mortal”. Thor drooped over and started snoring. 

Loki used his magic to put Thor on Akira’s couch and Akira covered him with a blanket. 

Loki and Akira went back to his bed. Akira whispered, “Thor and Frigga love you Loki. Don’t forget that. Talk to them when we have time.” He nodded, too exhausted to reply, but too keyed up to sleep. He’d have to ask her about his mother’s death later. And he’d have to remember to ask about Thanos. Thor had cut them off but he wondered if past Loki had known Thanos. 

Bringing him out of his thoughts, Akira asked, amused tone to her voice, “When did you turn into a snake?”

“I was a child. So, you’re courting my other brother Helblindi?”

She laughed, “Touché, I think it was just hooking up. Good night Loki.”


	9. Coronation

Loki woke up and donned his ceremonial outfit and helmet. He roused Thor and needled him to get ready for his coronation. The day flew by as the palace bustled preparing for the coronation. He teleported into his mother’s chambers dangerously close to the start of the festivities and enveloped her in a hug. He was being uncharacteristically affectionate, but he couldn’t stand the thought of losing her. “Oh, Loki” she murmured into his hair. “I love you just as much as Thor and I am so proud of the both of you”. 

As he pulled away from the embrace he asked, “Did you know?”, not really expecting an answer to what he was truly asking. To his surprise, Frigga scrutinized him, eyes widening in realization. He supposed that was an answer in and of itself. Frigga grabbed his arm right before he could teleport. 

“I knew but that makes you no less my son. I raised you with just as much love as I raised Thor. You are both my sons even though neither of you are my blood. Did you never think it odd that Thor never had any magical abilities despite both of his parents, Odin Allfather and Vanir royalty, being magic users?.” She paused before continuing, “Odin forbid me from telling you. Either of you. Thor was already there when I married Odin to end the Aesir-Vanir War. And a few centuries later, when Odin was fighting the Jotun, he brought you home.” She pulled him into a hug then said, “We will discuss this further after the coronation. Your brother needs you today”. 

Loki soon found himself standing at the front of the throne room. He was still reeling from Frigga’s honesty as he looked down on the thousands of Asgardian citizens whooping and cheering as Thor made his way up into the palace. He was sure they had all been drinking and raucously celebrating Asgard’s golden son receiving the throne ever since the coronation had been announced. He tuned out the revelry and Odin’s speech, focusing on sending a magical signal to Akira and looking through her eyes with his magic. She used one of the transportation spells he and Helblindi had made to enter Odin’s Vault. The royal guards startled, confused by the presence of anyone, let alone a mortal, in the bowels of Asgard’s vault. The Vault was warded by the All Father himself and they considered mortals little more than cattle. They hesitated, assuming she was harmless, then yelled in alarm as she grabbed the Casket of Ancient Winters and used it to amplify the spells they had crafted. Illusions of frost giants filled the Vault and the guards called for backup while wildly trying to fight the illusions. Akira used the Casket to seal the doors to the Vault with ice and haphazardly threw ice around the room, trying to give the impression that a great battle had taken place. 

Loki felt rather than heard Odin shout “Frost giants!” as Odin discovered their magic and the palace erupted in chaos. Thor was still kneeling on the floor as Odin and the guards swept through the throne room on their way to the Vault. Loki grabbed a gobsmacked Thor and dragged him to the Vault as well. He concentrated on Akira and saw her transport to Jotunheim before the Destroyer breathed fire on the unfortunate two guards.

Once they arrived at the Vault, they found healers tending to the two guards that had been guarding the Vault. They were singed but otherwise unharmed. Splintered and melting ice covered the room. Rain started to pour outside as Thor fumed about his disrupted coronation. Odin sighed at his antics but finished talking to the guards and continued examining the Vault for any breaches. When they were done searching the Vault, Thor confronted Odin to no avail. 

Loki put on a sympathetic face as Thor thundered at the All father shouting incoherently about needing to find out why they were invaded and the need to retaliate against the evil frost giants. Loki let the words wash over him as he waited for the largely one-sided argument to finish. Odin finally slammed Gungnir on the ground yelling “Enough! I forbid you to go to Jotunheim and take any sort of action. You will not do anything foolish to endanger Asgard. Nothing of value to us was taken and we do not even know that the Jotun were behind this. There are remnants of complex magic here and the guards weren’t able to tell if Jotun were truly here. It would be foolish to launch an attack until we know the perpetrator and even more foolish to break the truce we have with King Laufey.”

Thor responded, “But they broke the truce! Surely you don’t believe anybody but our enemies, the frost giants, could have done this. There is ice everywhere! As King of Asgard—”

“Not yet”. Odin paused and let the statement sink in. “I grow weary and the time for the Odinsleep approaches. I will not have you restarting a war while Asgard is vulnerable. I have nothing more to say on the matter. All is well, nothing dangerous was taken.”

Loki was intrigued that Odin didn’t mention the mortal that was seen or the stolen Casket to Thor but he supposed letting Thor go to Midgard was tantamount to genocide and even if the Casket was missing, it wouldn’t be wise for Asgard’s leader to be in the Odinsleep during the beginning of a new war. Curious, Loki wondered if Akira knew of the approaching Odinsleep. He snorted, she probably knew which side of the bed he would wake up on afterwards.

Odin swept out of the Vault to the Royal chambers as Thor fumed and headed the opposite way just to avoid walking with the Allfather. Loki mentally sighed and followed Thor, ready to nudge along the next part of the plan.

Loki followed Thor as he gathered the Warriors Three. Thor raged and Loki egged him on, agreeing that action needed to be taken against the frost giants. As expected, it took surprisingly little for Thor to come to the conclusion that they needed to show Asgard’s strength by fearlessly going to Jotunheim and battling some Jotun monsters. The Warriors Three were more than happy to defy Asgard’s king with them and surprisingly, even Heimdall was okay with it. 

As they waded through the snow, they found themselves surrounded by the silent Jotun warriors. Laufey warned them to turn back and Loki tried his best to deescalate the situation knowing simply venturing to Jotunheim was enough for Odin to feel betrayed by Thor. His heart rate increased as he spotted Akira barely peeking out from behind Helblindi. In his moment of distraction, one of the warriors told Thor to “Go home princess” and seconds later Mjolnir hit the insulting Jotun. Loki swore as the area exploded into a chaotic battle. Loki sent Akira back to Asgard while pretending to fight and focusing on minimizing the damage from Mjolnir’s hits. Even without Loki’s intervention, they would have been losing badly. Fandral had been impaled and they were hopelessly outnumbered. As they retreated, Heimdall did not retrieve them but shockingly, Odin himself appeared atop Sleipnir. He hushed Thor before he could say anything to make the already dismal situation worse and spoke to King Laufey, “Laufey. End this now!”

“Your boy sought this out.”

“You're right. But these were the actions of a boy, treat them as such. We can end this together, here, now, without any more bloodshed. Asgard no longer is in possession of the Casket of Ancient Winters. If you let us leave here without breaking the truce, we will not interfere if you regain it.”

Laufey paused to consider the ultimatum then agreed. Odin signaled to Heimdall and soon they were all back on Asgard. Before Loki could even breathe a sigh of relief that Thor had survived that battle, Odin was casting him out without his powers to Midgard. 

In shock, he and the Warriors Three stood at the Bifrost as Odin returned to the kingdom. While he had expected Odin to delay Thor’s coronation, he never would have guessed that Thor would have been stripped of his worthiness and sent to Midgard. But he had more important things to worry about, he would have to talk to Akira to figure out their next steps and deal with the inevitable repercussions of letting his mother know what he knew. He transported to his chambers and ran to hug a relieved Akira. They debriefed and went to the royal chambers.

Odin was sitting on his bed, looking millennia old, angrily explaining to Frigga what had happened when they strode in. Odin made a disapproving sound when he saw Loki but then his eye widened when he saw Akira, realizing she was the mortal that had penetrated the Vault and also sensing the Norns’ aura around her. 

Loki stepped in front of her to shield her and confronted Odin about his heritage before he could question her. “The Casket wasn’t the only thing you took from Jotunheim that day was it?”. Frigga stood up and stood next to Loki’s side, putting a comforting hand on his shoulder. 

The blood drained from Odin’s face as he quietly replied, “No.”

Loki continued emotionally, “You could have told me about that day. Why didn’t you?”

“You were my son, I only wanted to protect you.”

Akira stepped forward at this point, “Just like you protected your daughter until she no longer listened to you? You’ve unknowingly brought about Ragnarok with every poor decision you’ve made.”

Odin sighed, “Who are you? You're Midgardian but you're acting with the Jotun. You've already aided Asgard's enemies by stealing the Casket. What is your remaining purpose here? Why are you turning my family against me?” 

Loki scowled at that and replied, “She is speaker for the Norns and she is here to fix the mistakes you have made. YOU turned your family against you. You say Thor is unworthy to be a king? Well you are unworthy of being a father. To me, Hela, hel even to Thor. Does he know he is not Frigga’s child?” Odin remained silent as Loki struggled to regain his composure. “We need you to transfer Hela’s binding to something more stable so she will not threaten Asgard even when you are dead.”

Odin winced at that but Loki continued on, “And we need you to not interfere as we aid the Norns in preventing a fate worse than Ragnarok”

Akira interjected, “Loki will be king in all but title. You will be nothing more than a figurehead. Do you agree or do you dare go against the Norns?”

Odin agreed, sensing he was outnumbered and unwilling to incur the wrath of the Norns. He transferred Hela’s bindings to all of Asgard, ensuring her release only if all of Asgard itself, her source of power, was destroyed. With a last longing look at Loki, he fell into the Odinsleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> next update won't be till mid June. I also haven't watched Endgame yet.


	10. King Loki

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> haha I lied, here's a faster update because I didn't feel like studying and spent the day writing this. added a sentence 5/18, sorry guys i copied an earlier version.

Frigga handed him Gungir and bowed, declaring, “I’ve been tasked with keeping Odin safe during the Odinsleep. It would arouse suspicion if I were to suddenly abandon my post. You’re the king of Asgard now, Loki.”

He felt Gungir thrum with power and accept him as rightful king. He took a deep breath, once again floored by the revelations of the day. A Jotun sitting on the throne of Asgard. A mortal calling the shots. He felt lightheaded. Loki cared little for the Warriors Three, but Thor’s foolishness could have killed him today. And Odin. Odin had barely admitted culpability for stealing Loki. He wondered about Odin’s uncharacteristic quietness. Was it due to Frigga’s presence or some skewed feeling on the edge of his ego, threatening to fall over into the deep chasm guilt?

“Why did he take me?” 

Frigga replied, confirming his musings, “He wanted to bring Jotunheim into the kingdom. He wanted a king loyal to Asgard and one whose claim to the throne wouldn’t be challenged.”

Frigga beckoned him with open arms and be broke down crying in her arms. When he finally pulled away, Akira and Frigga both moved to wipe his tears away. Frigga gave a polite smile but she had a glint in her eye. Oh no. Loki did not envy Akira right now. Loki whispered in advance, “Sorry”. 

Frigga began while grabbing her arm, “Speaker for the Norns! You seem so familiar with my son and yet I know nothing of you. We must remedy that. Come, come and we’ll talk lady to lady”

“Mother, please, Akira doesn’t need your vetting”

“Akira! So that’s her name. Nonsense, I want to get to know your friend”

Loki sighed, she wasn’t going to let this go. Akira replied, “It’s okay, I’d love to get to know Queen Frigga better. Besides you should have an emergency court to inform them of Thor’s banishment and what to do to keep peace with Jotunheim”

Court had gone well. Surprisingly, all of the royal advisors, while they did not personally like him due to the centuries of pranks, respected him as a politician. They agreed that Thor had gone too far and had deliberated about what to do to salvage long term peace with the Jotun. Everybody agreed that something needed to be done and nobody wanted to go on the offensive but they couldn’t agree on what to do. After a few hours of back and forth, Loki suggested sending teams to negotiate an alliance with the Jotuns, particularly if Odin thought they had the Casket and were as powerful as they had been during the War. He had heard murmurs of assent and had adjourned court for the day, citing how tiring the day was and also giving the advisors time to truly consider if that was the best course of action. Most of the advisors stuck around to personally praise him for being a competent king. Some even going as far as expressing gladness that Thor wasn’t on the throne. Most of the advisors had warned Odin against putting Thor on the throne but he had never listened. As the last advisors left the throne room, Frigga brought a slightly harried looking Akira back. She bid them a goodnight and they returned to Loki’s chambers. 

“What did she say?”

“Basically found out everything I’ve told you in a few hours, everything there is to know about me, and very politely told me that she would willingly go against the Norns if I did anything that harmed her son.”

Loki laughed as Akira grimaced at the memory. Many people underestimated Frigga. He had gotten his cunning from somewhere after all. 

\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The next few weeks passed quickly. Loki ensured that negotiations between Asgard and Jotunheim went smoothly. He also convinced the court that they should renew their alliances with the rest of their allies, citing the invasion of the Vault as a wakeup call. They didn’t even know who had penetrated the Vault or why they did so. Asgard was supposed to be strong but it was clear they had been complacent during centuries of peace. They were a realm of warriors but they had been isolated and out of practice for too long. By working and training with warriors from other realms, they could improve their armies and also get more information about the going ons in the universe. 

Akira often wore a glamor so Loki could continue influencing the court while Akira as Loki helped with negotiations in other realms. In no time, they were renewing alliances across the realm. Akira went as herself to Musphelheim with Helblindi and convinced them to at least ally with Jotunheim in case of a larger threat. That was honestly a better outcome than Loki could have predicted. They all went together to Helheim to speak to Queen Hel and she quickly agreed, knowing such an upset to the balance of life and death would greatly anger the source of her power, the cosmic entity Mistress Death. Without life, there could be no death. 

In between negotiations, he did take the time to check up on Thor. Akira reassured him he would be fine, but Loki had to see for himself. Thor had easily shacked up with a pretty Midgardian, a Dr. Foster, according to Akira. And he appeared to be making a mess of things, being unable to adapt to being on Midgard but not otherwise harming himself. Loki only visited him when he was captured by some Midgardian leaders, briefly telling him that everything was okay on Asgard and hiding himself when another Midgardian somehow manages to talk Thor out of his imprisonment. Typical. 

And of course, the only people on Asgard vocally making it known that they didn’t like Loki’s rule, despite all of his decisions supporting and strengthening Asgard, were Sif and the Warrior’s Three. The vast majority of the populace disliked him, but they were respectful enough to not express it aloud. And as time went on, the populace actually started to like him, given that everything he did ended up benefiting them. Asgard had more trade deals due to the increased communication between the realms and life on Asgard was good. But of course, Sif had never liked him ever since he had dyed her hair black and the Warriors Three were loyal to only Thor and thought Loki was robbing Thor of the throne. Even if Thor had been on the throne, he inevitably would have angered Odin. They also seemed to forget that Odin had cast Thor out and not Loki. 

He noticed they had traveled to Midgard to whine to Thor and also that Heimdall had allowed it. He’d have to replace Heimdall soon. Eventually, Odin showed signs of waking up and Loki found his opportunity to do so. To prevent their interference in his plans, he sent the Destroyer to Midgard to go after Sif and the Warriors Three and right after Heimdall had opened the gate, burned him to a crisp with the Destroyer. The Destroyer went on to Midgard with strict orders not to harm the Midgardians and a message that Sif and the Warriors Three were wanted for betraying the King. 

As Odin slowly started stirring, he, Frigga, Laufey, and Helblindi bound his powers and cast him to a remote part of Midgard. Antarctica, he believed Akira had called it. The Jotuns went back to their home and Loki assumed Odin’s guise and Akira assumed Loki’s just in time for Thor to come flying into the chambers with Mjolnir and all of his armor back in place. He looked surprised to see Odin awake and then surprised them by kneeling and apologizing for his previous behavior. Thor admitted that he wasn’t ready to be king. Loki embraced Thor and said, “You might not feel ready to be king, but you are worthy now brother. Come let us celebrate your return.”

Before Thor could reply, a frazzled and out of breath Sif and two of the Warriors Three burst into the room, Volstagg trailing in later. Sif shrieked, “Loki sent the Destroyer to Midgard after us. He’s too power hungry and—”

“Enough” Odin said, hitting Gungnir on the ground. “I sent the Destroyer after Heimdall and you four because you’ve undermined Loki throughout his time in charge. Did you think I did not know he would become king after exiling Thor? I raised two princes not one, not that I need to justify myself to you. I sentence you all to prison for betraying both Loki and myself by interfering with Thor’s banishment. Be thankful you did not suffer the same fate as Heimdall, whose job was to be loyal to the King of Asgard, regardless of who that may be. ”

Loki whispered to Thor, “He burned Heimdall to death with the Destroyer, I’ve never seen him so mad”. 

As the guards came to drag them away, they cried, “We were only trying to look out for Thor!”

Loki replied, “I watched over Thor when he was on Asgard and I only came to him when he was captured. And I left as soon as I realized he was safe. Don’t equate your betrayal with concern for his well-being and return to power. If you truly cared about him more than hating me, you wouldn’t have done anything to interfere with his exile.”

When they were gone, Thor quietly said, “Much has happened in my time away. But alas, I cannot stay for long on Asgard. I have decided to defend Earth. My beloved Lady Jane has taught me much about Midgard and I wish to remain there to learn more and be with her.”

“I am happy as long as you are happy, son” Odin responded. “As long as you come back to fulfill your princely duties and are ready if Asgard needs to be defended.” He took Frigga’s arm and they exited the chambers. 

Sidling up next to Thor, Loki joked, “Well if she is so important to have changed your mind, when I’ve been trying to all these centuries, she must be truly one of a kind,” 

“Aye, and she is a scholar like you, Loki.”

“What does she study?”

“The stars. And she even knows of the Bifrost, even though she cannot comprehend that it exists.”

“Why don’t you ask her to come here and study them then?”

Thor paused, deep in thought, “I never considered that. She will not leave her work but if she comes to Asgard to study, that will not be an issue at all. Where is your mortal Loki?”

“Here”, a familiar voice called out. Akira appeared and Loki breathed a sigh of relief. Luckily, the real Loki had set up a spell that allowed them to communicate via their minds during all the negotiations. It was proving to be very handy in not arousing Thor’s suspicions. 

Akira said, “Why don’t we visit your Jane? She’ll be thrilled to see you and I’d love to see Midgard again”.

Thor loved the idea and they were soon on their way back to the Bifrost. As Thor’s back was turned to them the real Loki dropped both of their glamors so they didn’t have to pretend to be the other person anymore. 

“That was exhausting, did I make a good Loki?” Akira thought at him. 

“Indeed, you were kinder than I would have been, but this could have gone much worse. Though I have to ask, why are we venturing to Midgard?”

“Jane can be your new gatekeeper. And if she could study interplanetary travel, that would be helpful, because last time around the Bifrost was destroyed and that made leaving Asgard very difficult.”

They reached the Bifrost and ventured to Midgard. Jane was delighted to see Thor so soon and relieved everything was okay. Thor introduced them all to Jane, her assistant Darcy, and fellow scholar Dr. Selvig. Ah, so that was the man who had rescued Thor from his own foolishness. 

Loki thanked Dr. Selvig for freeing Thor and he chuckled and told Loki to call him Erik. 

Loki then proposed that Jane could come to Asgard to continue her research and that if she truly was seeking knowledge, she could be a gatekeeper that saw almost everything in the universe. 

Jane enthusiastically agreed to continuing her research on Asgard but cited the need to publish and disseminate her work for not being able to be gatekeeper. Darcy insisted that she and Jane were a package deal. And surprisingly, Erik asked if he could be gatekeeper. 

Loki looked at Akira and she shrugged, thinking at him “He’s an outsider and he has a good impression of you, why not?”

Loki smiled and agreed. They ventured back to Asgard together. 

After everything was settled with the Midgardians, Loki adopted Odin’s guise and called the entirety of the court and Asgard for an important meeting. He stood up to give a speech and began, “The Norns have approached me and warned me of a grave threat to Asgard and the Nine Realms and beyond. A being named Thanos wishes to gather Infinity stones, items of unimaginable power, and use them to destroy half of all life. We need to prepare for war and work with our allies to overcome this threat”

Months passed and Loki and Akira traveled together to their allies’ realms and informed them of the threat. The realms promised to unite in the face of the threat and resources were poured into making weapons, defenses, and crafting spells across the nine realms. 

With everything in place on Asgard, Frigga took the throne on Asgard and Loki and Akira ventured to prepare Midgard.


	11. Motel 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Trying to fill in some plot holes, have some feels. The action is about to start. I finally watched Endgame.

They spent the morning on Jotunheim before leaving for Midgard. Laufey had spread the magic contained in the Casket to all the Jotun and was busy helping revitalize the land and preparing for war. Compared to the last time they visited, there was a lot more flora covering the land and more small wildlife scuttered underfoot and in the air. Loki was thrilled to see that he had managed to correct one of Odin’s many wrongs. He saw Jotun children laughing and shooting magic at each other. One stray spell resulted in a snowball bursting like confetti in his face. The shrieking children all suddenly fell silent, at bothering a stranger, and an Asgardian one at that. Loki smiled and made large snowflakes waft down towards the group. Byleistr, the youngest brother, walked up and sent the children on their way. When he embraced Loki, his glamor receded again and Loki allowed it, instantly feeling more comfortable on Jotunheim. It was amazing, in his Jotun form he could actually feel the land thrumming with magic. 

He thought back to the journey it had been to get comfortable with his true skin. During the months of diplomacy, behind heavily warded doors, Frigga and Akira had joined forces to help him get more comfortable with his heritage. He had practiced dropping the glamor and gotten more in touch with his Jotun magic. Once he had mentioned his magic sessions to Laufey, Helblindi, and Byleistr, one of them would open up a communication spell to help Loki practice his magic. Akira had been very excited about communication spells, comparing them to some Midgardian technology called a “facetime”. 

Frigga had been covering for him with Thor making excuses about his whereabouts but eventually Thor cornered him after one of these magic practice sessions. A determined Thor was not easily deterred. While Loki hadn’t been avoiding Thor, he hadn’t been seeking him out either. He was content to rule Asgard and plan for the future without thinking about the brother who had been raised to think his kind was monsters. He and Akira had just left Frigga’s chambers when Thor barreled into them. Loki could have transported away but he couldn’t reach Akira to take her with him. Frozen in indecision, Loki remained silent as Thor barraged him with questions about his absence until Frigga had intervened. Fortunately, she ushered them all back into her rooms and told Thor the truth. Loki had been so scared of Thor’s response he barely processed what she was saying but she told Thor of Loki’s origin, his own origin, and the life of their older sister Hela. Thor had been shocked into silence by all the revelations but then he approached Loki, placed a hand on his shoulder and asked, “Is this true, Loki?”

Loki had nodded fighting back tears. Expecting the worst, he turned away to avoid Thor’s inevitable outburst. But to his surprise, he felt Thor envelop him into a bear hug. Thor said, “You will always be my brother. I will always love you and there is no one I’d rather have by my side.”

Loki pushed out of the hug and glared at him, “How can you say that so easily when you easily attacked Jotunheim and injured or killed how many Jotun?” Thor looked pained at that but Loki continued acerbically, “And our friends or rather yours. Sif and the Warriors Three. Did you see how quick they were to turn against me when I was on the throne? I never wanted to be king, I only ever wanted to be your equal. I have lived in your shadow for far too long so I suppose it’s fitting I am a creature of shadows— ”

He was interrupted by Thor enveloping him again, squeezing him tight enough to make his ribs creak. Thor spoke quietly into his shoulder. “Loki, I apologize for my actions. I have been foolish and hotheaded all these years. You were always the smarter of the two of us. I never meant to cast a shadow but I see I have hurt you. And I will endeavor to change.”

Loki was pulled out of his memory by Byleistr asking him to spar. They shot icicles and ice shards at each other. Byleistr blew a swell of snow into his face and made jagged ice erupt from the ground. Loki leaped out of the way and created an ice staff he hurled. His fighting style as a Jotun had vastly improved since his practice sessions with his family. Thor had even pitched in and after a few sparring sessions, Loki was able to easily best him. His family had agreed that it would be most useful to be well versed in both types of magic so he could bring out his Jotun appearance and magic as a distraction and powerful weapon. 

In between rounds of sparring, he checked in with Akira. Loki chuckled at Byleistr’s attempts to tease Helblindi while he was with Akira. Helblindi had opened up a communication spell with Gatekeeper Selvig and Akira was engrossed in a conversation with him. They were venturing to Midgard because Akira had asked Selvig to keep an eye on the Tesseract, a vessel for the Space Stone. The same government organization that had monitored Mjolnir had moved on from gathering data on the Tesseract to actively prodding at it. They were apparently creating weapons with it and Akira thought it was time to retrieve that particular infinity stone. Thor was staying in Asgard to be with Jane but he was ready to provide support on Midgard if necessary. They had told him about everything except Odin’s whereabouts and he was eager to help. Turns out they might not have needed to, the day after Thor cornered him and promised to be a better brother he had burst into court and demanded everyone leave so he could talk to Odin. Instead of yelling, Thor had calmly but icily had words with Odin about how he had failed Loki. It was truly terrifying to see Thor so venomous and be on the receiving end of the vitriol directed towards him as Odin. Loki showed no remorse as Odin, probably exactly how the real Odin would have responded, and Thor had stormed out vowing not to speak with him till he made things right with Loki. Loki felt a surge of warmth at the memory, though it had happened ages ago. Thor was truly a changed man after his banishment to Midgard and was actively trying to show his support and love for Loki. Akira tugged on his sleeve, communication spell apparently over, once again pulling him out of his thoughts and leading them towards the Great Hall. He had been so busy for months without any break that he supposed as soon as he came to Jotunheim, he felt like he could ease up and lose himself in his thoughts. 

They dined with Laufey, then he bid his Jotun family goodbye. He and Akira took the Bifrost to Midgard. They were in the same desert Thor had been dropped in, some place called Albuquerque, New Mexico. Akira had explained that she was hoping the use of the Bifrost would attract the government’s attention. 

She secured lodging in a rundown building using a plastic card stored in the back of a Midgardian device called a phone. Akira had sighed in relief when it had worked at something called an ATM that stored currency. 

When they had gotten inside the room, she had said, “I wasn’t sure it was going to work. My phone certainly doesn’t but I guess the number on the credit card has been the same for a while."

Loki hummed noncommittally in response, taking in their meager surroundings. He wrinkled his nose in disgust at a particularly noticeable oil stain on a pillow. While he had slept on the ground many times during adventures, he did not think sleeping in this Motel 6 would be much better. It might actually be worse. Akira had tried to explain that it was a motor hotel or a motel. But he truly believed sleeping in the metal contraptions outside might be better than resting on the beds inside. An odd smell emanated from one corner of the room and he grimaced. 

Akira was still rambling. She had a tendency to do that when stressed. “I guess past ME is still out and about at this time.” She checked the date. “Wow yea, past me is in California while I’m currently here in a motel in the middle of nowhere town in the desert. “ 

Loki nodded in understanding. They were traversing a strange, untraveled path. He tried to distract her from the current situation. “What were you doing now?” he queried, then frowned at the accurate but butchered grammar of his question. 

And just like that, they spent the rest of the day talking about their past lives. Akira spoke of her training as a healer of children while Loki reminisced about the foolish and dangerous quests, he had been on with Thor and his, no Thor’s friends. He had experienced heartbreak over and over again as a child when he realized that they were not truly his friends. They were always present but they never followed his suggestions unless Thor did as well. Their actions spoke much louder than their words. They were never there for him. And yet now they were rotting in Asgard’s dungeons while Loki’s friends and family had increased greatly. 

He spoke freely of his diplomatic missions and Thor’s gaffes. This was the first day they had been truly free with nothing to do but wait since they had met. Akira praised his handling of volatile situations and laughed in disbelief at Thor, Sif, and the Warrior Three’s antics. Loki rarely got to tell stories, it was always Thor who regaled them with the stories of his strength and bravery. Loki’s contributions were rarely mentioned even though they usually led to their success on good days and prevented their deaths on the bad ones. He had spoken to Thor about it and he had been better at acknowledging Loki’s contributions at recent feasts, though he suspected Frigga had played an important role in that. 

Akira had also opened up about life after Thanos and how governments had fallen and everyone was unable to completely move on. Loki also remembered to probe about past Loki’s life. He learned of the Convergence, the invasion of the Dark Elves, how Hela was released and how Ragnarok had occurred. He learned of Thanos’ torture and how he had been controlled by the mind stone to invade Midgard with massive Chitauri forces. 

Their conversation was interrupted by a firm knock on the door. Loki cautiously approached the door and put himself between Akira and the door. Loki opened the door slowly to see a nondescript harmless-looking man who Loki could tell was anything but. The man asked, “Prince Loki, brother of Thor right? Were you the one that sent the Destroyer?”


	12. Doorways

Loki put on his best diplomatic tone and explained away the Destroyer before beginning to explain the Norns’ prophecy with Akira interjecting to make it relevant to Earth. He learned that the unassuming man was named Coulson and that Coulson worked for a militaristic government agency. Loki listened on just as raptly as Coulson when Akira explained that several of the infinity stones were present on Earth and that the battle before the snap happened on Earth. Coulson immediately understood the severity of the threat and asked to call his supervisor. Soon they were speaking to a man named Fury. 

Akira and Coulson both recapped their discussion then Akira informed them that the Tesseract was an infinity stone. Fury immediately caught on and refused to give it up, citing the need for greater defenses and weapons to protect Earth, catalyzed by the realization that nothing Midgardian could take down Thor at full power. Loki suppressed a flare of anger. Only he was allowed to beat Thor. These Midgardians were foolish to think they could go against a god unassisted. If he hadn’t met Akira first he would have probably hated Midgardians. Coulson was dangerous in how he revealed almost no information but prompted others to give up all of theirs. Fury was a skilled manipulator. It took one to know one. But Loki ultimately had the trump card of offering Midgard and alliance not only to the Asgardian army, but those of all of the Nine Realms. Just as Loki was beginning to offer said alliance in exchange for any infinity stones present on Asgard, they heard a pulsing sound and shouts in the background of the phone call. 

“What’s happening?” demanded Akira. Loki looked over at her. All the blood had drained from her face. She turned to him, “Loki can you take us to the Tesseract right now?”

Loki nodded and after a location spell he teleported them to where Fury was. The scene that met them was tense. Scientists were running from monitor to monitor, unable to figure out why the Tesseract was giving off such strange energy readings. A Midgardian archer of all strange things correctly identified the Tesseract as a doorway in which someone seemed to be entering. Fury looked about ready to have an aneurysm, trying to divide his attention between the rapidly destabilizing stone and the two new people that had popped into existence in the presumably secret SHIELD base. It suddenly hit Loki, this was the start of the Chitauri invasion. 

Akira shouted over the din to be heard, “I didn’t expect the invasion to happen, but Thanos has many followers. One of them is probably leading the forces.” She wondered more quietly, “Who would he trust enough?” 

Her face got impossibly paler and Loki felt a trill of fear go up her spine. The only thing Akira truly feared was Thanos. She shouted, “We need to go RIGHT NOW. Thanos is going to send one of his daughters and they will kill everyone. And somehow if that doesn’t kill us, the portal that’s about to open will destroy the base.”

Fury and the scientists set off alarms to evacuate. Akira pointed to Fury and the archer. “We need them. Can you take all of us and teleport back to the hotel?”

Loki did as asked just as the Tesseract began to create a portal. A very shocked Coulson greeted an equally stunned Fury and archer. Fury immediately began yelling at Akira and Loki, unsure who was more deserving of blame, “YOU IDIOTS LEFT THE TESSERACT YOU CAME TO GET. AND NOW WE HAVE NO INFORMATION ON WHO CAME THROUGH.” He paused to take a breath. Loki absentmindedly noted that Fury had an eyepatch and mannerisms similar to Odin. Fury continued, rounding on Akira “And you, you mentioned an invasion. If you have all this information why did you wait this long to tell Earth, your own planet? Barton, can you work on getting the feeds from Pegasus, we need to figure out what we’re dealing with. ” 

Akira finally interrupted, “I thought the invasion wouldn’t happen at all since Loki isn’t under Thanos’ mind control but since it is happening, I guarantee you nothing we could have done would have stopped it. I’m not just in charge of Earth’s wellbeing Fury, there are many planets in the universe and trust me, I’ve come back to Earth in the right time. Instead of focusing on assessing the threat we need to respond. Let me break it down for you, it’s bad. Whichever daughter came through has another infinity stone, the mind stone, and can use it to control anyone. She will be planning to use the tesseract to open a doorway to the Chitauri army to lead an invasion. We need to assemble the Avengers, NOW. We got out of there when we did so no high ranking member of SHIELD or person with the knowledge Loki and I have would fall victim to Thanos. Last time, your precious Barton was mind controlled and he killed countless agents and nearly crashed the Helicarrier. That’s gotten your attention right? Monitor the Tesseract sure, but make getting the Avengers together a priority first.”

A shocked silence followed Akira’s speech. Akira added, almost as an afterthought, but Loki knew it was anything but, “Let us handle recruiting Tony Stark. You idiots screwed it up last time.”

Coulson and Fury burst into action as if dismissed, while the archer finally introduced himself to Loki and Akira before joining the other SHIELD agents in their efforts. As soon as the feed from the base was secured, they watched a blue cyborg figure emerge with a scepter, grab the tesseract and shoot a blast that knocked out all the cameras. Akira breathed out, “Nebula.” The cameras outside the base showed her escaping the collapsing base in a Jeep with a terrified young agent. 

Loki used a communication spell to summon Thor and once he had landed outside, quietly asked him to report back what the SHIELD agents were doing. He didn’t trust them at all. Thor went off with the SHIELD agents as Loki and Akira teleported to New York City to recruit Tony Stark. 

Akira had gushed on and on about him. He was a genius and billionaire. After the snap, he had felt so guilty about not saving everyone that he had stepped in to lead the masses when the world’s governments had fallen. He poured all of his earnings into philanthropic efforts including recruiting all the surviving medical and mental health providers to help people come to terms with what had happened. Akira had become close friends with him after she noticed his panic attacks, nightmares, and soul crushing guilt, unfounded as it was. Loki was looking forward to meeting him. 

They walked through crowds of bustling Midgardians to a massive metal and glass building that boasted STARK tower. Akira confidently strode in with Loki tailing her. Loki wondered how she was going to play this. If this Stark was as important as she said he was, practically Midgardian royalty, they would not be allowed to see him if they simply walked in the front door. She immediately walked to the front desk and leaned over while quietly saying, “I have important information on the new energy source for Stark tower. The receptionist frowned at that and asked if she was a reporter. Akira shook her head no and smiled. “Do you mind if I stand here?” she asked gesturing at some muscled men in dark suits, the security no doubt. The receptionist nodded quickly, already holding her phone and talking to someone. Akira and Loki walked over to the guards and Akira scanned their surroundings. Loki followed her gaze. She was making sure to make eye contact with the unobtrusive cameras scattered around the lobby. Loki noticed that the crowds of people taking pictures inside the lobby began to dwindle, ushered out by more men in suits. The receptionist approached them and said, “Mr. Stark will see you now.” 

She pressed a button and revealed a hidden elevator that took them up many floors to Tony Stark’s penthouse. Loki marveled at the technology in the building. Midgard had advanced greatly since he last visited, and Stark appeared to be the one leading the way. 

They stepped off the elevator into a tastefully decorated living room with a grand view of the New York City skyline. A short brown-haired man with carefully maintained facial hair stepped out of another elevator at the opposite side of the room. He was breathtaking. He commanded the attention of the room even without speaking. He looked at them scrutinizingly and inquired, “So what do a pediatrician and an honest to god alien being monitored by SHIELD know about my tower? I haven't even made the announcement about the new energy source yet.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SHIELD does look up and monitor past Akira but don’t approach her because she doesn’t know anything/ the imminent invasion. Tony has access to SHIELD, JARVIS hacked them a while ago. He doesn't trust anyone after the whole Natashalie mess in Iron Man 2.


	13. Stark Tower

Akira replied, “I’m from the future but more importantly, Earth is about to be invaded by an alien army called the Chitauri. They’re going to use your tower’s sustainable arc reactor energy to open up a portal during the invasion. We need your help to defeat them.”

Stark stared at them for several long moments. “This is insane. That can’t be possible.” He held up a hand. “Nope, don’t say anything. I’m going to figure out what to do with you.” He looked up and spoke to someone unseen, “JARVIS can you double check that? Are they affiliated with SHIELD? Hackers? Competitors? Terrorists? Is there another of her running around in California?”

An unseen voice connected to the unseen presence Loki had felt since they entered the building, the elusive JARVIS it seemed, verified that another Akira was present and that they were only tangentially involved with SHIELD.   
“Well I guess the only silver lining in all of this, if you really are from the future, is that the tower’s arc reactor is successful.” He finished with a weak chuckle. 

Akira chimed in and Stark gave her the stink eye for talking. Loki snorted in amusement. He liked this one. “We prefer not to affiliate ourselves with SHIELD.” She paused, “You could say we’re consultants for SHIELD”. She smiled. 

“Still not helping me believe you’re not with SHIELD. A SHIELD agent would know my consultant status. Fury has made it very clear that they only want Iron Man and not Tony Stark.”

Akira ignored the irritated man and continued talking, “And JARVIS? In the future, I’m sure you’ll be relieved to know, Mr. Stark never donates you or all the bots to a community college.”

At that Stark tossed something at Akira who caught it. Loki had been surprised, Stark had shown great restraint so far even though they had forced their way into his house, albeit with words, and given him an unpleasant truth. The device gave a whine as if powering up then was silent. Surprisingly, Akira appeared to be unharmed. She whispered quietly, “It’s just an EMP Loki, it only affects Midgardian technology.”

Akira silently placed it on a table in front of her. “You don’t like to be handed things so I’m just going to put this here. I assure you, we don’t have any bugs on us. And we mean no harm to your creations.” 

Akira’s eyes widened, then she excitedly continued, “You don’t like to be handed things! You named your AI after your childhood butler. You created an entirely new element to power your arc reactor. The Ten Rings no longer exist because you wiped them out. The first thing you had when you got back to the states after your escape was a cheeseburger. You told me about Yinsen.” 

Smart, Akira knew things about Tony that the general public did not know. 

Voice devoid of emotion, but relaxing almost imperceptibly, Tony repeated, “I told you about Yinsen. I haven’t told anybody about him”.

“I know but you trusted me enough in the future to tell me about him. How he kept you alive and died to help you escape”.

Stark nodded. “Okay I’ll bite. How do we defeat them?”

“I have one more thing I need to share before we work together” She looked pained. “A future colleague knew this but never told you and it was a terrible betrayal”.

Stark gestured grandly with exaggerated bravado, “Well what are you waiting for, do share with the class”.

Akira smiled sadly, “You should sit down for this Tony.” Tony and Loki sat down on the couches in the living room and Akira continued. “Your aunt Peggy founded SHIELD and your father was also very involved in its beginning. However, soon after SHIELD was founded it was infiltrated by HYDRA when they hired Arnim Zola and other German scientists. To this day, many high-ranking SHIELD officials are HYDRA. HYDRA has an assassin called the Winter Soldier who has been the longest ever prisoner of war. The Winter Soldier is Bucky Barnes, a soldier from World War II that was kept alive by a different version of the super soldier serum. He’s had his mind wiped many times over the past 50 years so HYDRA could continue to control him. He killed your parents under HYDRA’s command. I am so sorry Tony.”

Stark’s face was ashen and he appeared sullen. “I need a drink,” he said. He went over to his bar to pour one. He held a glass out to Loki and Loki accepted, joining him at the bar. It was the least he could do. He knew how it felt to be on the receiving end of Akira’s information dumps. Loki couldn’t imagine what was going through the man’s head. Stark downed the glass in a sip. Stark asked while pouring himself another drink, “So what’s her deal? Is she omniscient? You’ve been awfully quiet this entire time ET. When’s this army coming? Be honest with me, how bad is it?”

Loki was surprised by Stark’s quick change in demeanor. He was all business with a laser sharp focus. If Loki hadn’t seen him 5 minutes prior, he would have thought nothing had happened. Loki frowned, but answered. “She’s functionally omniscient, she’s from a very bad future so she’s been sent back to try to fix the universe. Three actually omniscient beings called the Norns sent her back. She knew you in that bad future and you were pretty close so I would trust her understanding of Earth. She also has the old me’s knowledge and memories so she has a limited understanding of other events in the universe.” He sipped his drink trying to figure out how much to tell Stark. 

He heard Akira speak quietly in the background, “JARVIS, would you mind calling Miss. Potts and Colonel Rhodes and asking them to come to the tower? I’m sure Tony could use the support of people who care about him that he actually feels comfortable around. And don’t allow him to lock himself in the lab.”

“Yes Miss. Sri”, JARVIS replied. 

Loki continued, trying to be as truthful as possible while being careful to not add too much for Stark to deal with in such a short amount of time. “The invasion will happen in a few days. It’s going to be pretty bad. The being who sent the army, Thanos, is insane. But fortunately, he and the army are eons away. Unfortunately, his daughter Nebula is already on Earth and in possession of two very powerful artefacts called Infinity Stones. The Infinity Stones were created at the start of the universe and lend their wielders unimaginable power. Nebula has the tesseract or space stone that can open portals between great distances. She also has the mind stone in a scepter that allows her to mind control others. Akira and I are working on getting the stones away from Thanos so you don’t need to worry about him yet. For now, we need to work together to stop Nebula and minimize the invasion. As for HYDRA, Akira hasn’t told me anything about that so maybe both of you will work together on that.”

Akira piped up, “I’ve given a list of names based on what I remember to JARVIS. He can work on HYDRA surveillance, but our priority right now is the invasion and keeping track of the stones. Why don’t you take the rest of the day off? Miss Potts and Colonel Rhodes are en route” Stark made a strangled sound at that, but Akira continued on ignoring it, “Proceed as planned with Stark Tower and uhh, try to make your suit as space proof as possible. Can’t hurt,” she finished much less confidently than she started. “We’ll meet you again on SHIELD’s helicarrier. Oh, and this is the latest version of the Starkphone in case you need a distraction from all of this. But you will need to deal with your thoughts and feelings eventually. Drinking isn’t going to make those disappear”. She placed her phone on the bar and smiled sympathetically. 

Even after they left, Loki couldn’t stop thinking about Stark. He was a kindred soul. They hadn't been at his tower that long but he had made an impression. He wasn't like the other Midgardians he had met. He was honest and strong and flawed. From what he had heard from Akira, he solved his own problems and created with his own two hands. Loki hoped he survived this mess.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tony normally compartmentalizes/ would throw himself into work to not deal w thinking about what happened to his parents so Akira called in his support system to help process.


	14. Tony Stark

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> CW: mental health, PTSD, panic attacks, anxiety  
> we're switching to Tony’s POV!

Tony’s POV

After the time traveler and the alien left, Tony went down to the lab and immediately tried to find out the truth behind his parents’ deaths. His head pounded as he began to process everything they had told him. Tony even had JARVIS replay their conversation a few times as he figured out what to do and in what order. He felt like no matter what he started with there was too much to do and too little time. An annoying logical voice told him that devoting time to searching for the truth about his parents’ deaths was a waste of time. His parents had been dead for a while. At first, he had mourned and cursed Howard and slowly made his peace with their untimely deaths through sheer necessity. But Akira had ripped that wound right back open. They were days away from a planetary invasion where the time traveler had implied, he would be in space. But all he wanted to do was confirm what she said and work until he passed out from an exhaustion so deep even the nightmares couldn’t get him. That was wishful thinking, however, the nightmares would be back with a vengeance. He felt truly awful, on par with the palladium poisoning

He had already felt on edge when they appeared in his lobby. Then Akira had gone ahead and mentioned Yinsen and he was suddenly dragged from the safety of his tower back to the hot sands and the waterboarding and the gunfire from every direction and most pervasive of all Yinsen’s ragged breathing as he died begging him “Don’t waste it. Don’t waste it.”

He laughed humorlessly as he remembered the flashback that haunted every nightmare and some unpleasant days. Tony supposed if the lady from the future knew about Yinsen, things in that world must have been truly post-apocalyptic. Never in a million years had he expected to tell anyone about Yinsen. He hadn’t even told Rhodey and Pepper and they had been there with him through everything. And if he had told someone he had only known for a few years in this future? Despite the circumstances, it was kind of hopeful. If a god and a time traveler were asking for your help, you had to have done something right with your life. 

He felt nauseous. He had never once doubted that Howard had been drunk at the wheel and killed both himself and his mother. Realizing he was wrong felt like the shrapnel was tearing through his chest all over again. That he and oh god even Pepper had trusted SHIELD to a certain extent when they had honest to god Nazis in their organization. Akira and Loki had given him so much shit to deal with that the invasion barely merited any anxiety. Yinsen. His parents. HYDRA. The invasion. A bigger enemy behind it all. A nearly overwhelming panic threatened to consume him.

But it wouldn’t do anyone any good to have a panic attack right now. Breathing deeply, he told himself, “You can do this”. JARVIS went through his self-programmed anxiety protocols and at the end of them Tony felt marginally better. That was going to have to be good enough, he had work to do. He had JARVIS do a deep search everywhere he could think of for any information regarding his parents’ murder. He scanned the list of names Akira had given JARVIS and breathed a sigh of relief when he didn’t find Agent Agent, Fury, or Romanov. Tony then focused his efforts on deepening his access into SHIELD. It would help in the upcoming fight against HYDRA and maybe it would shed some light on the murders. 

When he was accessing SHIELD’s last surveillance footage of the Tesseract, Pepper and Rhodey arrived at the lab. Tony told them about his parents’ murder and the impending invasion, not willing to divulge anything else and worry them even more. He appreciated them being there, of course, but he would never have called them and taken them away from their responsibilities. Rhodey had clapped him on the back and promised to ask his higher ups for any information on the Winter Soldier. He also made it clear that they would talk more about how Tony was doing over drinks after he made some arrangements. He almost immediately got on the phone with his supervisors and forcefully requested that War Machine be present to deal with an extraterrestrial threat SHIELD had failed to contain that threatened the safety of their valuable asset Tony Stark. Tony was forced to stop eavesdropping on the rather loud call when Pepper quietly asked him, “Are you okay?”

“Yes.” He paused. “No. But I don’t have time to be not okay”

“Tony” she chided. 

“Pep-Pep” he wheedled. 

She looked at him pointedly and he gave an exasperated sigh. She wanted to talk about feelings right now and wouldn’t take no for an answer. “I don’t know Pep, I just feel like I should have known. I should have done more after my parents’ deaths. I just accepted it as an accident. And all I want to do now is find out the details. You know I don’t care much for Howard but I don’t know. I should have known.”

“Oh Tony. There’s no way you could have known. The entire world didn’t pick up on it either. It is not your fault that you didn’t figure out the circumstances of their deaths”

“I know but it’s just that I’ve been blaming him for all these years for mom’s death and turns out he isn’t even the one to blame. This brainwashed assassin is. And I can’t even be mad at the bastard, he’s got to be the longest living Prisoner of War and on top of that, he knew Howard. James Buchanan Barnes. They worked together during the war. Captain America’s right hand man.”

Pepper laid a comforting hand on his and he continued, “It’s just too much at once. All of a sudden there’s time travel and aliens and they’re going to use Stark Tower. And they’re going to use my tech to power the invasion.” He paused, suddenly exhausted, “I was so excited about this green energy project—”

“As you should be. Just because some alien is going to hijack your tech doesn’t mean you shouldn’t show the world how to create sustainable energy. We can always rebuild. And it seems like you have some pretty powerful people on your side to help.”  
“You got that right” Rhodey chimed in. 

They spent a few hours researching SHIELD’s databases on Nebula, the tesseract, Akira, Loki, and Thor. Pepper and Rhodey also helped him look up anything on the Infinity Stones. They found a lot of lore on how they were made at the creation of the universe and that there were apparently six. 

Then Jarvis, Pepper, and Rhodey teamed up to get him out of the lab and into bed and he was too exhausted by the day’s events to even complain. His sleep was disjointed as he had nightmares of Afghanistan, his parents dying, and the sky opening up and eating his tower. Pepper and Rhodey were in the room with him, soothing him and allowing him to fall back asleep after each one. With their help he actually managed to get a solid 5 hours of sleep. 

He woke up somewhat refreshed and hopeful. Tony was able to consider his situation more clearly, less clouded with the previous day’s emotional fallout. He was always given a pile of shit to deal with. At least this time around he wasn’t alone and they had someone who knew all the plays before they would happen. Tony was cautious around all new people but Loki and Akira genuinely seemed to have no ulterior motives. Defeating a criminal who was invading Earth and wanted to collect powerful stones. Pretty good motivation. And the Yinsen thing made him really trust her. 

They had breakfast together the next morning and then Pepper went off to announce the launch and Rhodey had to report back to the Air Force. Both asked him to call if he needed anything but soon enough he was back down in the lab, finishing up the final touches on the tower’s energy source and then bringing it online that evening. Pepper had returned to the tower for the launch and even had brought some champagne but Tony declined, knowing he was crunched for time. He made Pepper promise to get as far away from NYC as possible and then he went down into the lab to finish creating the next suit. 

When he finally took a break from his whirlwind of productivity, JARVIS snarkily told him how much his productivity would decrease the longer he was awake along with some colorful graphs and animations of accidents that could happen in the lab due to sleep deprivation. JARVIS told him it was 2 am and needled him to eat, reminding him of the leftover Indian food in the lab fridge, no less than 20 feet away from where he was sitting. 

Tony compromised, too exhausted to argue but not quite willing to call it a night. As he was shoveling curry and rice into his mouth while examining the latest phone the woman from the future gave him. 

He swore “Nikola Tesla” as aforementioned woman and alien partner suddenly came into existence a few feet above the worn-down couch he was sitting on. They promptly proceeded to crash into a tumble of limbs as Tony yelled in surprise again. He managed to save the curry. The rice was less lucky and grains went soaring in every direction. Dummy and U immediately came over to investigate the mess, a rare mess they had not created, and the two new people in Tony’s lab. They rarely got guests. 

“Apologies” Loki said while waving a hand and suddenly a green wave of magic cleared up and disposed of the spilled rice. Woah that was cool. He’d have to look over if JARVIS picked up any energy readings of the magic. He had been tweaking his scanners since their last visit and reading that not only was Loki a god, prince, and an alien, but a magician as well. 

Akira was enthusiastically shaking Dummy’s claw and praising both bots for investigating the disturbance as Loki looked on curiously and petted U. Tony allowed himself a smile. They were entertaining at the very least. He could see how he came to like Akira in the future. She had a no-nonsense attitude just like Pepper and was tough as iron. He was sure she would have intuitively known if he had started drinking yesterday and would have enlisted Loki to dump out all the alcohol in his tower. She was smart and resourceful and got along well with JARVIS and his bots despite them just meeting her. She didn’t make unreasonable demands and made sure to keep him informed. Even at 2 am in the morning apparently. He had a feeling that she truly understood him and accepted him despite all his flaws and eccentricities. She hadn’t even flinched when he had tossed the EMP at her. Sure, he didn’t appreciate the landslides of problems they brought but it was better to anticipate and prepare for the shitshow to follow than not. And he was glad to finally not be alone in looking at and dealing with the big picture. And despite all the feelings she had uprooted about his parents, it was better to know. She knew his past with betrayals and made sure to lay out all her cards on the table before asking for help and he respected that. He’d have to ask her about which colleague betrayed him in the past timeline so he could steer clear of them. 

Loki nudged Akira and then she turned around to face Tony, easy smile slipping off her face as she turned serious. 

“Sorry for teleporting by so late but SHIELD basically yelled at us to be your liaison. And I’m sure you like us slightly more than Fury and Coulson.” Tony guffawed at that. She placed a device on the table in front of them that displayed files of information on the Tesseract and profiles of different people. “They gave you this to read. Get to it if you can and make sure your suit is ready for battle. And don’t worry, they have an army, but we’re going to have one too.” She patted Loki on the shoulder. “This one is a prince of two planets and his biological species are badass ice giant warrior magicians.” Loki look strained but smiled sheepishly. 

Ice giants huh? This day just kept getting more interesting and interesting. Tony wondered why Loki looked like he had sucked on a lemon. He was all for getting all the help they could to defend New York and his tower. 

“And make sure you keep eating regularly and get some sleep. We’ll get out of your hair soon but be ready for battle. Nebula’s going to make a move soon.”

Loki then asked him, “Do you have any questions? I know exactly how it feels after Akira flips your world upside down. She’s done so a few times with me.”

Tony laughed outright at that. “YES. Give me context. You’re big picture people. I’m a big picture person. Let’s be big picture about Thanos and the Infinity Stones together. I can help. You know, genius after all.”

Akira looked delighted at that. That was a hell of a confidence booster. 

Tony questioned, “Would taking the tower offline help prevent the invasion? Why aren’t we doing more to stop the invasion from happening altogether? Where are the rest of the Infinity Stones? What do we know about Nebula? Thanos? Where are they and the Chitauri right now?”

Loki patiently responded, “We’ve decided to deviate as little as possible from the last timeline because despite some significant changes certain events from the other timeline are happening. Both times my brother was banished to Midgard. We have been able to change some things. I’ve ruled Asgard and forged alliances with little consequence. But we feel it’s risky to change things too much for past events we know are going to occur.” 

He looked at Akira and she nodded for him to continue. “Last time around, I was captured and tortured by Thanos and mind-controlled into leading the invasion on Earth. That’s why we didn’t expect an invasion this time around. But Nebula is Thanos’ more ruthless daughter. Her invasion will make mine seem like child’s play. If we shut down the tower, she might just open up the portal somewhere else with other tech. She is almost all machine and very good at working with them. She might open it wider. Or worst-case scenario, Thanos’ advisors or Thanos himself might come to Midgard when we are woefully unprepared.”

Yikes. Tony nodded, “And if he came here we’d have no shot at getting those two Infinity Stones.”

Akira nodded, “We know approximately when and where two more stones will appear. A group called the Guardians of the Galaxy eventually runs into a third one but we don’t really have a timeline on that or a way of contacting them.”

“So only one stone unaccounted for. What are you planning on doing with them?” 

“Right. You’ve done your homework. Destroying them before Thanos can get his hands on them. Thanos is on his home planet. Nebula has been dropping dead bodies left and right so it’s only a matter of time before we find her. The Chitauri are in deep space which is very far away but the tesseract can open up a portal to bring them here instantaneously.” 

“I can’t believe dear old dad studied it back in the day.”

Loki chuckled, “I think your arc reactor’s energy is similar to the Tesseract’s. I feel it must certainly be as powerful.”

Tony grinned and removed the cover hiding the light of the arc reactor in his chest. “Flatterer. Good thing it’s keeping me alive then.” Loki gaped and looked accusingly at Akira. 

“What?! It wasn’t my story to tell.” Ohh Tony liked her even more now. 

“He has the energy of a star in his CHEST and you didn’t think that was relevant to mention?”

Tony cut in, “I was kidnapped and tortured by some terrorists and made this to keep the shrapnel from one of the missiles I made from shredding my heart”.

Loki looked even more distressed at that. Tony beamed and waved his hand, “Don’t worry about it, I’m fine. You guys are more than welcome to stay at the tower. You’re a great ego boost and it would be good to get to know each other if we’re going to work together.”

Now Loki looked incredulous. Akira said, “You’re breaking him with your life story and generosity. Thank you. Of course, we accept. And now we can just teleport you to wherever Nebula emerges.”

Tony smiled. This looked to be the beginning of a beautiful team.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was in such a hurry to upload the chapter I forgot to say, them teleporting and falling onto the couch is a nod to my other works World Walker and It's Raining Men.


	15. Flying Fortress? Falling Fortress

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> back to Loki's POV

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Big thank you to TimeLadyHope, annabella_lector, and SeizeTheJay that always comment and keep me motivated. Extra fast update for you guys.

Loki’s POV

Tony was working on the suit and Akira was busy conversing with Jarvis and documenting everything they needed to do for Midgardian politics to ensure the smooth creation of a Midgardian army for the inevitable battle against Thanos when Thor opened his communication spell with Loki. Loki quickly transported them to a chaotic scene with Midgardians running in every direction and screaming. 

Thor flew over to them and they approached the epicenter of the panicked screams together. They saw a muscular man dressed in blue with a circular shield swinging wildly and getting absolutely pummeled by Nebula despite her considerably smaller size. A large black ship started firing on her as she blocked with her forearms and some of the blue skin on her arms started burning and peeling, revealing a metal skeleton underneath. Nebula knocked the larger man out with an elbow to the head and bodily threw him at some unfortunate running Midgardians, trapping them. She touched the scepter to a few of the citizens and they pushed the man with a shield off and surrounded Nebula, preventing the ship from firing. 

Akira shouted, “Don’t let her touch you with the scepter, she can mind control you with that!”

Tony flew in and carried off one of the Midgardians before returning for the others. As he was returning, Thor entered the fray from behind and swung at Nebula with Mjolnir causing her energy blast aimed at Tony to go astray. She dodged several missiles Tony sent her way, snarling and then focusing on sparring with Thor. Thor batted away her attempts to hit him with the scepter and she soon switched to throwing punches. After several feints, she successfully punched Thor in the face with such force that his head snapped to the side. That bitch. 

He quickly cast a shield on Akira before entering the battle as well throwing several daggers at Nebula. She flipped several times dodging all of them but then Tony returned quipping, “Hey Smurfette, why don’t you pick on someone your own size?” while nailing her with an energy beam from his chest that knocked her forward towards Thor who hit her with a lightning blast from Mjolnir. She yelled and suddenly retreated at a superhuman sprint before scaling a building in seconds and shooting an energy blast into the air. The blast caused the black ship to shudder and careen dangerously towards the buildings and the crowds. Thor and Tony went to slow the ship’s descent as Loki flung a large icicle at Nebula causing her to drop back to the ground in surprise. 

“Curious, an Asgardian that wields ice magic,” Nebula commented casually, as if they weren’t engaged in battle. 

“And other magics as well” Loki replied while creating a dozen clones of himself that encircled Nebula. 

His hands glowed green with an uncast spell as Tony and Thor rejoined the conflict aiming gauntlets and a hammer at Nebula respectively. The passed-out man, seemingly awake, also joined them and yelled, “Stand down, we have you surrounded”. Loki nearly gave himself away by turning to look at the irrelevant man incredulously. Asking Nebula to surrender, let alone deescalate, would go as well as asking a bilgesnipe to cuddle 

But shockingly, Nebula scowled and threw down the scepter. Loki felt his jaw drop as the unnamed man jumped into action, handcuffing a smiling Nebula. Something wasn’t right. He let his clones dissolve and picked up the scepter before heading off to find Akira. 

As they were boarding the jet that somehow was still working, Loki looked inquiringly at Akira. Tony, who was chatting nonchalantly with the increasingly confused useless Midgardian, quickly caught on and looked at her too. She shook her head and mouthed, “Later.” 

They flew into a massive flying fortress and Nebula was led off to parts unknown as he, Thor, and the Midgardians filtered into the center of the ship. A video of Fury threatening Nebula played on the screens but Thor, Akira, Tony, and himself congregated in a corner, ignoring the feed. The redheaded Midgardian, ah the assassin, took notice and also joined the group, causing Tony to frown. The Midgardian archer, how quaint, trailed behind her, leaving the soldier the only one paying attention to the screen. 

Thor began, “That was a fierce battle but it ended much more swiftly than I thought it would”

“Agreed” Loki replied. 

“Do you have any idea why she’d want to be here?” the assassin inquired.

“Last time around, the scepter made us all fight with each other and the helicarrier was attacked to delay our response to the opening of the portal”, Akira responded. 

“So shouldn’t we get her out of the helicarrier?” the assassin asked. 

“No, if we introduce too many unknown variables then we’ll lose whatever we know about what’s going to happen.” Tony interjected.

“Loki, maybe you can try removing or containing the enchantment on the scepter.” 

He nodded and the group looked as more people joined the circle. A meek looking curly-haired man smiled, joining them. He made Loki immediately uneasy. Huh, so this small man contained the great beast. Fury, Coulson, another SHIELD agent, and the solider also entered the group. 

Loki smiled widely at them and left to work on the scepter, Akira following him despite their exclamations. 

Half an hour later, he had a rudimentary understanding of the spell when Tony, the scientist beast, and the soldier out of time entered the room. 

“Reindeer games! Oracle! Great to see more reasonable people again. I would have left when you guys did but I needed to unencrypt all of SHIELD’s secure files from the inside.” The soldier made a sound of protest but Tony ignored him, barreling on, “I’d like to introduce you to Dr. Bruce Banner, a fellow scholar that I respect very much.”

“Loki, Asgardian and Jotun prince, nice to meet you.”

“Akira, time traveler and speaker from a dystopian future”

“Steve Rogers, Captain America. Why are you hacking into SHIELD? Is Fury not telling us something?”

“Of course, he’s Fury. Could you go? You’re breaking Loki’s focus.”

The captain looked affronted but acquiesced, saying, “Sorry ma’am”, as he strode out the room. 

“Seems like they didn’t completely unfreeze his brain”

Tony burst into laughter. “Thank god, he was getting on my nerves. Loki, Akira, we’re going to be searching for the Tesseract”

Banner and Tony bantered good-naturedly about Midgardian science in the background as Loki isolated and contained the corrupting spell. 

Loki questioned aloud, “Could we remove the mind stone from the scepter?”

“I don’t know if we’d be able to handle it without it’s container. It’s usually too much energy for one being”

Just then, Tony called for Akira. Loki wandered over to their area of the lab and saw schematics for Tesseract energy-based weapons. 

“Hydra”, Akira murmured.

Another computer let out a beep and Banner and Tony rushed toward it. Their triumphant smiles quickly turned to frowns. 

“The Tesseract is heading straight for us, now would be the time to suit up”, Tony instructed

Loki summoned his armor and Tony opened a briefcase that started assembling his Iron Man armor just as the helicarrier shook with impact, throwing everyone off their feet. 

They had barely recovered when SHIELD agents began flooding the room and attacking them. Akira grabbed the scepter and stood by Banner as he and Tony started to disable the agents, making their way towards the bridge. 

A severe looking brunette woman ran up to them and told them one of the engines was down and that they needed it to stay in the air. 

Tony quickly agreed, “We’re on it”

Loki looked at Akira. “Go! I’ll be fine, we have a Hulk!” she shouted, gesturing at a sheepish-looking Banner.


	16. The Gunfight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Akira's POV

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really wanted to name this chapter "Agent Hill, who looks hot and sexy holding her gun" because it's in the original damn script and I had to share that piece of ridiculousness with you.

Akira's POV

A SHIELD tactical team started firing in a sweeping fashion across the bridge. Akira grabbed Bruce’s arm and crouched underneath some desks. Hill’s voice rang out clearly, “Hostiles in SHIELD gear, hold your positions and engage anyone attacking you.”

The remaining SHIELD agents started returning fire and bullets flew overhead as Akira and Bruce tried to remain as still and low to the ground as possible. Akira looked at Bruce and he nodded. He was being surprisingly calm. If it weren’t for all the bullets, she would be rocking back and forward and wondering how exactly her life had led to this moment. 

A small object was tossed towards the center of the bridge, feet away from them as Fury shouted, “Grenade!” Without hesitation, Bruce burst into action, sprinting towards the grenade, growing taller and exponentially bulkier with each step. Bullets pinged off his skin, which was becoming progressively more and even more green, and his blue sweater ripped as the Hulk let out a roar. The Hulk grabbed and pulverized the grenade in his hand, the explosion contained in his hand. 

He drew the fire of both Nebula’s agents and Shield’s agents. Oh that wasn’t good, Hulk started roaring and doing what he did best, smashing everything in sight indiscriminately. Hawkeye and Black Widow suddenly appeared, firing at mind controlled agents while using the rampaging Hulk as cover. They started trying to herd him to little avail, simply making him more mad with exploding arrows and gunfire.

Akira opened up their mental communication spell, “THOR, where are you? We have a big green problem”

“Maiden Akira, the Captain and I are having a small blue problem?” Thor grunted with effort and then continued, “They are breaking Nebula out.”

“That’s okay, let them get away. She’s going to find a way to escape anyways.”

Akira heard some more sounds of battle before a horrified “NO!” and silence. 

Loki suddenly joined the conversation, “Thor, what’s happening?”

“Nebula dropped SHIELD brother Steve off the ship and brought an explosive device onto the ship, I’m flying it away from here.”

“Oh that’s not good. Throw it as far away as quickly as you can, we don’t know when it’s going to go off and any little thing could set it off” a new voice added.

“Is that Tony?” Akira asked.

“Yes, I added him when we were fixing the engine. Thor, you great fool, you could have called me and I would have teleported it instantaneously to a pocket dimension”

“You worry too much Loki, I’ll be fine. I’ll be back to battle in no time and we can show the Midgardians how to properly fight” Thor replied then cut off his end of the spell. 

Loki made a frustrated noise and updated Akira, “Tony and I are on our way back to the bridge to help contain the Hulk.” 

Akira suddenly noticed a fighter jet firing into the Helicarrier directly enraging the Hulk and causing him to run closer to the edge of the ship. 

She had a terrible idea. “HULK, HEY HULK OVER HERE. The bad flying man can’t hurt you here. Follow me!”

To her initial delight and growing fear, he seemed to understand. Akira started running further into the ship, glaring at Hill as she went by, Hulk obediently following her. Of course, SHIELD would focus on getting Hulk off the already fragile flying ship but Akira didn’t want Nebula separating any of the remaining Avengers before the invasion. 

This of course, was the scene that greeted Loki and he immediately got Hulk’s attention by making him run into a wall of pure magic that made the Hulk cry out in pain and surprise. 

“Loki, WAIT!”

Hulk smashed the energy barrier knocking Loki down with the force of it and then picked Loki up by the leg and flung him into a nearby wall. Akira winced in sympathy and made her way over to see if he was alright. She had another terrible idea, but hopefully it would be just as successful. She thought back to old Loki’s memories of spell work and repeated the incantation for a healing spell. Loki suddenly sat upright with a gasp of air. “How did you do that?” he asked incredulously. 

Tony interrupted, “Hey Wonder Twins, you’re welcome.”

Akira and Loki focused their attention back on Tony and the Hulk. Iron Man had successfully talked down the Hulk, with a bag of blueberries of all things that he got from Norns knew where in the middle of a battle. 

Hulk seemed amused by the tiny berries, being incredibly gentle and rolling one around the palm of his hand with one pudgy finger, momentarily distracted from causing further destruction. 

They suddenly heard a distant rumble of thunder and Thor burst through the same window the jet had been firing though. He let a bolt of lightning fly at the Hulk. 

Iron Man quickly flew up in the air, taking the bolt directly to the chest. Hulk slowed his backward trajectory and asked, “Puny metal man okay?”

“Yea I’m alright big guy. Wow you guys really are brothers” Tony commented. 

Before anyone could even breathe a sigh of relief, or roar in Hulk’s case, Nebula entered the room. Tony immediately released the largest chest unibeam Akira had ever seen, pushing Nebula back down the hall. 

She snarled. “Do that again and I will bring down this entire ship. I’ve hacked it while you were so busy being a caricature of a team”. To bring her point home, she let the ship drop in free fall for a few seconds. 

As everyone struggled to regain their footing, Nebula grabbed the fallen scepter and retreated with a considerably smaller gaggle of SHIELD agents back onto the ship that originally rammed the Helicarrier. 

As the ship departed, Hill started directing the uninjured SHIELD agents and Romanov, Barton, and Fury made their way over to the gathered group. 

“Yes, yes we know. The Avengers Initiative. We’ll work on our teamwork and communication. Could you focus on getting us out of the sky before Nebula makes that decision for us? And getting us transport to Stark tower?” Akira began before Fury could get a word out. 

Fury looked apoplectic but conceded. “Everybody better get a damn comm before we land. Knowledge of the future or not, this was a shitshow.” 

As the ship began a dizzyingly rapid descent, Akira made eye contact with Loki and nodded. It was time to bring the Jotun army to New York City.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Nebula was captured in Germany as a distraction to disrupt Earth's defenses, try to separate the team, and start the invasion without interference.


	17. Battle of New York

Loki’s POV

Loki teleported Thor, Tony, Banner and Akira to the street outside Stark tower. Akira had forced him to wear Fury’s infernal communication device in his ear. He tuned out Fury’s colorful swearing at leaving the SHIELD agents behind and looked to the top of the tower. There was a large blue energy barrier at the top of the tower. Tony flew up to investigate and Loki sent the signal to Laufey. A bright light erupted from the sky bringing groups of Jotun warriors to assemble in the streets of New York City. 

Loki smiled at Thor and his brother beamed back. Thor’s girlfriend was as smart as he had claimed. She had created a version of the Bifrost on Jotunheim because although Asgard and Jotunheim were on better terms, they were not willing allies and the average Asgardian would see Jotuns coming to Midgard as a repeat of their past invasion.

Midgardian citizens had stopped to stare and take photos as the street filled with the Jotun army. Akira asked Fury if SHIELD or the government could send out an evacuation alert. As Fury was making some excuse as to why they couldn’t, Loki made all the trashcans on the street explode, causing them to scream and run away. Akira gave him an exasperated look but didn’t criticize the chaos. She made her way over as Fury was still talking about how some Midgardian Security Council didn’t want to cause a panic and that they wouldn’t do anything until aliens actually attacked Earth and showed him how to mute Fury’s line on the comms. 

Loki quickly introduced Thor to Helblindi and Byleistr and then all Hel broke loose. Thousands of Chitauri poured out of a gaping portal in the sky. The Chitauri started firing on them and the surrounding buildings and Midgardians. Akira shooed him off, promising to stick with someone who could defend her at all times. Then she and Banner started directing Midgardians to safety. Loki, Thor, and the Jotun army surged forward to meet the first invaders. 

Loki summoned his staff and knocked the nearest Chitauri off his cruiser before using it to fly into the oncoming forces, skillfully throwing magical blasts, daggers, and ice at the screeching soldiers. Thor was swinging his hammer and battering any invaders that got within arm’s distance before flying into the swarm and sending out a shockwave of lightning that knocked dozens of Chitauri out of the sky. 

But most incredibly, the Jotun army was slaughtering the Chitauri. The sky was soon filled with blizzard force winds and snow that made the Chitauri cruisers and energy guns malfunction. The Chitauri were forced to roam the streets and fight hand to hand with their useless weapons Some Jotun were cutting down the opposing with sharp sword-like ice attached to their arms while others were impaling them with icicles that erupted from the ground and the buildings. 

Loki had eliminated enough Chitauri to place a target on his back. He taunted them with illusions of himself and watched with satisfaction as they unwillingly shot each other out of the sky. The survivors continued pursuing him and he led them on a high-speed chase weaving in and out of the tall buildings and causing them to crash or lose control of their vehicles with complex turns and maneuvers. As he turned a corner, a larger black and grey Iron Man suit fired repulsor blasts and missiles concurrently, obliterating the rest of them. 

“Thank you. Did you go up to your tower to simply change out of that ridiculous red and gold design. You’re a flying target in that color scheme”

The Iron Man suit laughed wholeheartedly at that. “Nah, as much as I agree with you, I’m James, Tony’s friend and pilot of the War Machine suit”

They were both startled by a familiar voice in their comms. “Platypus, Avatar. You both wound me.” He paused and they heard sounds of battle. “I’m headed your way with a pissed off Nebula on my tail who might actually wound me.” 

Loki let out a strangled sound as James exclaimed “God damn it Tony” and as promised, Tony flew around the corner of a skyscraper. He was mere feet away from then when Nebula leaped from a Chitauri cruiser onto Iron Man’s back. The suit immediately dropped then spiraled, Tony swearing while trying to get Nebula off. 

James was trying to shoot at Nebula but their flight pattern was too erratic to damage Nebula alone. Loki made a split-second decision to launch himself at the pair, finding purchase on Iron Man and Nebula’s arms. 

Nebula snarled and he snarled back as he let his body change to his Jotun form, freezing off most of Nebula’s forearm. She disturbingly let him and in horror, Loki soon realized why. Her arm had no flesh or bones and was purely mechanical. 

Fury’s voice cut in over the comms and the battle was briefly interrupted by the arrival of an army of SHIELD agents. Nebula smiled creepily at him then detached her arm at the elbow, falling unharmed onto the Chitauri cruiser that brought her here. As she stood up, she clutched the scepter and smiled triumphantly. Just as they began flying up and away, a circular shield hits the Chitauri pilot, followed closely by a massive lightning bolt striking Nebula directly. 

She yelled in pain before piloting the cruiser herself, flying close to the ground and shooting at the unarmed Midgardians hiding in buildings. A dozen Chitauri cruisers in the area also began doing the same, targeting all the civilians. 

Loki realized in rapid succession that he was still hanging onto Iron Man and that he was in his Jotun form. Iron Man gestured for him to hold on and soon they were flying into the fray, a chaotic mix of Chitauri energy blasts, lightning, shield throws, bullets, missiles, repulsor blasts, and arrows. 

\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Natasha’s POV

Natasha was pissed that the Asgardians and company had left them on the helicarrier. Some team they were. She got Captain America’s attention and Clint fell into step beside her. Soon they were flying a quinjet to the NYC coastline. 

As they got closer, they looked on in horror at thousands of aliens pouring out of a massive hole in the sky above Stark Tower. Luckily, the city wasn’t crumbling to pieces because a sizable army of blue giants was fighting the influx and winning. Loki had delivered. There was an alien army of ice giants defending the Earth. 

Natasha landed on a snow-covered building and soon they were helping with civilian evacuation efforts. Clint was covering her from above as she held off the Chitauri, allowing civilians to escape to the safety of a police perimeter. She soon managed to disarm an alien and took great satisfaction in shooting at the remaining with one of their own guns.

They started sweeping the police perimeter, helping civilians escape and defeating Chitauri. They soon stumbled upon a squadron of Chitauri surrounding a building. 

As Natasha started disabling soldiers, she heard Captain America gasp and soon saw why. Banner and Akira were standing at the door of the building. 

She quickly wondered why the Hulk wasn’t out yet and why Loki had left Akira alone. She delivered a devastating roundhouse kick to an alien while shouting at them to take cover just as the Chitauri fired at the building all at once. Yet shockingly, Akira had thrown up a glowing orange energy barrier. Even more shocking, a few seconds later, the barrier disintegrated in a massive energy blast that obliterated the first few rows of Chitauri. 

Strange. As far as SHIELD knew, Akira was supposed to be a baseline human. And she hadn’t used any magic when the helicarrier had been invaded. 

The Chitauri roared angrily as Clint yelled “I got it”, and shot a series of exploding arrows to distract the enemy. Akira backed him up, creating nightmarish copies of herself scattered between the remaining soldiers. They work together to take down the last few soldiers and Natasha is alarmed by Akira’s energy blasts that hit the invaders harmlessly then burn them from the inside out a few seconds later. 

Banner shouts inside the building, “It’s safe now, come on out.” A few dozen civilians scurry out of the building, murmuring frantic thank yous and heading towards safety. 

Akira rushes inside and walks out with an ice giant who is glowing with magic. Banner makes sure they all move away from the building and then it collapses. 

Natasha berated herself. She had missed so much intel on Akira and she had been too distracted by her new abilities to notice the ice giant that had been there the whole time. She watched as Akira hugged him? Her? It? She might not even know the gender of the ice giant, but she trusted her skills enough to know that there was definitely some history between the two of them. Banner patted the giant on the back and Steve Rogers like the boy scout he was thanked it and introduced them. 

Natasha learned that he was called Helblindi and that he was Loki’s brother. Before she could ask any more questions, Fury gave her Nebula’s location and they made their way over.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tony runs into Nebula at the tower. He doesn’t do the whole drink conversation and doesn’t get thrown out the window because if he took off the suit Nebula wouldn’t hesitate to kill him. Does manage to piss her off, especially when the scepter doesn't work on him and she chases him.


	18. Leviathan

Tony’s POV

In the disarray of the battle, Nebula had disappeared. Tony flew above the cross fire and saw her heading towards the portal over his tower. 

He cursed his luck while flying towards his building. Of course, even alien conquerors couldn’t resist the arc reactor. He winced as a Chitauri soldier was slammed by Jotun power into the letters of his building. 

Only the S, A, and K remained. He paused mid-flight as blue energy from the portal knocked off all of the surviving letters. Nebula had opened the portal wider and Tony looked on in horror as a gargantuan alien monster, an honest to god Leviathan, emerged above his tower. He was not alone in his shock. The Jotun army had collectively stopped fighting, letting the invading forces escape, to look at the looming threat. 

Tony opened all the comms, “Guys, bad news, Nebula opened the portal wider and there are these flying whale sized Eldritch horrors coming through. Come back to Stark Tower.” 

Black Widow’s voice cut through the sounds of dismay on the comms, “We need to close that portal. Can the Jotun help with the monsters?” 

Tony looked below at the Jotun and saw Loki teleport into the area the Jotun army was gathered in. 

Loki and a unit of Jotun mages sent a blast of magic at the Leviathan but it continued flying off, unbothered. More of the Jotun army stepped forward and created a blizzard so cold it froze the soldiers solid, causing them to hail down on the street but again the Leviathan remained unaffected. 

Loki, with frustration in his voice, admitted, “None of our magic is working against the Leviathan. I fear it is useless for them to keep trying and exhausting their magic. They are but a small army and they have injured.”

Another voice interrupted, “I am King Laufey of the Jotun. What my son is so politely trying to say is that we have overextended our abilities in the battle so far. With less than 100 beings we have defeated thousands but I fear we cannot fight anymore. We need time to rest and recover or else we’ll collapse and perish in the battle. I fear we must return to Jotunheim but I believe if you close the portal, the battle will turn in your favor. Best of luck mighty Midgardian warriors.” 

And with that a bright light erupted from the sky, taking the Jotun army with it. 

One of the SHIELD agents, the archer if Tony remembered correctly, was swearing up and down. Tony felt for him. This was the exact definition of bringing a knife, or in this case bow, to a gunfight. SHIELD must be in absolute pandemonium right now. Tony shuddered at the thought. He would not want to anywhere near Nick Fury right now. 

“Language”, Captain America tried interjecting. 

“Oh shut up,” Akira responded. “We need a plan. We need to close the portal and deal with the Leviathans and Chitauri that have already made it here.”

“How about Akira’s magic?” Widow inquired.

“What?!” Loki and Thor chorused, saying exactly what Tony was thinking. Tony kind of thought of her as Wonder Woman but in a Pepper level of competent kind of way, not glowing hands and eyes. 

“I saw her defending civilians with these energy blasts that ripped through the enemy and burned them from the inside out.” 

That was a sickening image. Tony had seen Loki’s magic in action, and it was a dream. It was intuitive and laser precise. It was nothing like what Natasha was describing. 

“Absolutely not. Even if she was wielding some form of magic, she is untrained. And besides, these creatures are impervious to magic” Loki responded. 

Tony replied, “Bruce, have we tried throwing the Hulk at it?”

A nearby Leviathan shattered the windows of a building while making a tight turn onto another street. 

“It’s worth a shot” Bruce responded. 

And soon the Leviathan that had just disappeared from view made a reappearance, crashing into the ground. 

Cheers went up and Tony flew towards the injured Leviathan to see Hulk doing what he did best, smashing. 

Captain Killjoy soon told them to cut the chatter and began assigning roles. “Hawkeye, get somewhere high and look out for patterns in the Chitauri. Thor, slow down the incoming aliens out of the portal with your lightning. Everybody else that can fly, create a perimeter. Let’s disable any Chitauri soldiers and try to keep the Leviathans from getting too far. Widow, Loki. Why don’t the both of you work on closing the portal. And Hulk, smash!”


	19. Cut the Wire

Loki POV

As loathe as he was to admit it, the soldier had assigned fitting roles to the loosely assembled team. He knew the Widow trusted him just about as much as he trusted her but he could work with that. They were somewhat similar. She was a trickster of sorts, just much more lethal than Loki felt the need to be. Despite the lack of trust, Loki respected her. She a Midgardian with no notable powers or tech was able to hold her own and incapacitate Chitauri as well as the rest of them. 

She smiles at him. All teeth. “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” she says while pointing upwards. 

He smiles back, equally as sharp then grabs her arm and teleports them onto a Chitauri cruiser overhead, knocking the aliens off in unison. Natasha flies the cruiser higher and higher towards Stark Tower when Hawkeye shouts, “Nat, watch out, Nebula’s on your tail!”

Loki turned back in time to see Nebula catch an arrow aimed for her head. She smiled mockingly in the direction it came from, just the distraction Loki needed to magically cut the power on the cruiser. Through pure luck, the arrow exploded at that moment at well and Nebula fell several hundred feet, directly into the path of the Hulk. 

Loki shuddered instinctively as the Hulk began to swing Nebula into the floor, creating a deeper depression with each blow. Hawkeye was whooping on the comms.

Natasha finally reached the top of Stark Tower, now missing its characteristic letters, and acrobatically dismounted the cruiser. Show off. Loki teleported directly next to the blue energy barrier and frowned as the energy of it pushed on his magic’s energy. The Tesseract was sitting innocuously in the middle of it and Chitauri were shouting as they entered the portal above it in the sky. 

“What do we know?”, Natasha asked. 

Loki replied, “It’s raw energy from the Tesseract, an infinity stone, it’s near impenetrable. It’s fueling itself.” He made a sound of disgust. “She designed it this way.”

“What about using another infinity stone? We could cut through the barrier and shut down the Tesseract. The scepter has one too right?”

Loki gave her a small smile at that. “That just might work. One infinite power against another.”

“We’re in luck”. She pointed at a small balcony below the roof. The scepter was perched precariously on the damaged edge of the balcony. 

Loki summoned it and handed it to Natasha. It was near imperceptible, but he saw surprise flash through her eyes. “You had the idea, you should be the one to take the credit.”

She gave him a genuine smile at that. She thrust the scepter and began to tear a hole through the barrier. 

She spoke confidently on the comms. “I can close it!”

“Do it!” Captain America shouted. 

“No, wait!” Iron Man shouted. 

“Stark, Chitauri are still coming through!”

“I got a nuke coming in, it's gonna blow in less than a minute. And I know just where to put it.”

Loki’s heart stopped as the Captain replied, “Stark, you know that's a one-way trip?”

He knew. No wonder Akira liked him so much. He watched in horror as the Iron Man suit guided a missile towards the portal. 

“NO! There has to be another way!” James shouted, voice ragged with emotion. 

“You know there isn’t Rhodey. There isn’t enough time. Tell Pepper I’m sorry.”

James is hovering next to them in the air by the portal. 

They share a look then Loki looks upward, fearfully watching the Iron Man suit disappear into deep space. Logically, he knew Tony survived in the last timeline. But as the minutes passed he grew more and more distressed. 

Suddenly, all the Chitauri and Leviathan keeled over. 

“Come on Stark,” Natasha whispered tensely. 

Loki viscerally feels the heat before he even sees an explosion the size of a supernova approaching the open portal. 

“Close it.” Captain America demands and Natasha deactivates the Tesseract.

Akira is screaming no on the comms and Loki winces as the portal in the sky gets smaller and smaller. 

But just before it closes, something falls out. As it gains speed, they realize it’s the Iron Man suit. 

Rhodey is already in action, moving to slow Tony’s descent. 

Just before they make contact, Loki realizes Tony is falling too fast. The Iron Man suit slams into the other suit, James only barely slowing down their descent. 

Loki moves to craft a spell powerful enough to slow his fall as he hears the characteristic whir of Mjolnir before he takes flight. 

But before either of them can do anything, Hulk leaps into the air, cradling both the suits as he smashes into and slides down a building. 

Hulk flings them off of him and Loki reacts in just enough time to cushion their fall. The bold red and gold suit is motionless, lacking the life and bravado of the man inside. 

Loki takes the scepter and Tesseract and throws the two infinity stones much more haphazardly than he should into a pocket dimension before taking Widow and teleporting them down to the street. Akira is running up the street towards where they’re gathered.

James had removed his helmet and is crying besides the stationary suit. Akira looks like she’s been crying for a while. Loki approaches the suit but he fears it’s too late for Tony to possibly be healed. 

The Hulk lets out a distraught roar and Iron Man’s eyes suddenly glow and the suit surges back to life. 

Tony gasps as he opens his faceplate. His eyes are wild and he looks every which way before focusing on Rhodey. “What just happened?” He looked to Loki and makes a face. “Please tell me Rhodey didn’t have to kiss me.”

Loki chuckled at that while James good naturedly punched him. This ridiculous, selfless Midgardian. Stares into the face of death and immediately makes a joke. 

“We won.” the Captain says, finally at ease and smiling. 

Loki looked fondly at Tony as he babbled on about something called shawarma, touching his face and healing him of his injuries. Tony looks at him in awe after that but their interaction is cut short by Hawkeye’s insistence that they secure Nebula. 

They find her firmly embedded into the asphalt of the road, limbs slightly sparking and a scowl on her face.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The only reason why Gamora the favored daughter didn't lead the invasion is because Nebula begged Thanos to lead the mission to prove her self and conquer Earth for him.


	20. Thor

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you as always to my dedicated fans, especially TimeLadyHope and slytherpuffrules. I appreciate your guys' comments.

Thor’s POV

Thor ensured Nebula couldn’t escape by placing Mjolnir firmly on her chest and then their group, the Avengers, went to eat some Midgardian food called shawarma. Stark had suggested it and the group had readily agreed. It was the least they could do. The man had flown into the stars, singlehandedly destroyed the Chitauri army, and had managed to survive by the grace of Mistress Death. 

Thor had learned a lot about modern Midgardian politics since Loki had assigned him to shadow the SHIELD agents. People often underestimated him as the large friendly dumb blond, but he had the same schooling as Loki. He knew how to seek information and he was trained in diplomacy, war, and politics. Sure, he hadn’t ever needed to use those skills because he’d been with Loki his entire life, until his banishment, but it didn’t mean they weren’t there. 

Thor finally put his centuries of learning to use when he infiltrated SHIELD. He kept up the friendly foreigner act and since he seemed so different from his brother, they assumed he wasn’t capable of deception. Fools, Loki would call them and laugh because Thor had been trained by the best. Thor had learned they were closely monitoring all of the members of the team that weren’t SHIELD agents. They coveted Stark because of his mind. His Iron Man suit, despite being a defensive armor, managed to be more offensive than most Midgardian weapons. Thor had also gleaned that Stark had previously been a weapon smith that had been so successful at war profiteering, he had been given the title, Merchant of Death. 

They monitored the man behind the Hulk constantly, never truly letting him out of their sight even though they had no hopes of controlling him. They even tried to control what the soldier out of time was exposed to. They used emotional manipulation to gain his loyalty to SHIELD because his paramour had founded the organization 70 years ago. 

To his dismay, they considered Loki a large threat and did not completely consider him an ally. They feared Akira as well but had little information on her and even less about the Norns other than some myths. 

He had seen them experimenting with the Tesseract’s infinite energy, a force they had deluded themselves into believing they could control. He looked over at Loki and they made eye contact before his brother imperceptibly nodded. He’d need to discuss what he’d found out about SHIELD with Loki once they were alone. 

Thor had sworn himself Midgard’s protector, but he hadn’t realized he would be protecting Midgard from itself so much. Hydra was the insidious force within SHIELD but SHIELD wasn’t without fault either. Thor sighed as he chewed a piece of meat. Midgardian warriors and war had greatly advanced since the days of crude spears and hunts, but they were still as barbaric in a way. Though they had won the first battle, there were many to come in this war. And war this was. He finally understood what his father no what Odin had meant. 

\------time skip------

The next day, they bid their Midgardian friends goodbye and call on Erik to open the BiFrost. The Einherjar greet them and secure Nebula. She resists but is subdued, injured and physically deformed as she is. 

He watches as they lead her down the renovated bridge with glittering railings on the side. Loki has been shifting nervously the entire morning with Akira sending him pointed looks. They think they’re being subtle. He chortles as he turns back around to face them, catching them in one of their silent conversations. “Brother, something is on your mind. Remember what mother said? No secrets between us.”

“That’s the thing, Thor. I’m afraid we’ve kept one more secret.”

Loki fidgeted with his hands. Thor furrowed his brows. Was he angry about their family promise being broken so easily? Absolutely. But, he hadn’t seen Loki this openly nervous in centuries. And Loki, his clever younger brother always thought and overthought things through. There must have been a reason for lying to him about something important. So yes he was angry, but he was also concerned about what was distressing his brother. What could Loki have possibly done that was making him so anxious?

Loki continued, “Let’s not keep Mother waiting. I’ll explain everything once we’re at the palace.”

As they entered the throne room, his mother dismissed everyone and embraced him, Loki, and a surprised Akira. 

Loki told her, “I’m going to tell him.” 

His mother looked surprised but then smiled and replied, “That’s probably for the best.”

Thor was growing impatient now. Loki lying he understood. But his own mother too? Especially after everything that had happened the last time their parents had kept secrets from them?

He looked at the throne and his anger continued to rise. Where was Odin? Surely he’d have heard about their arrival. Could he not be bothered to greet the two children he’d taken into his home?

Loki’s voice cut through his thoughts, “I don’t know how else to put this. Odin is no longer king.”

Thor’s thoughts halted. He felt as if he had been struck by lightning. “Fath—Odin is dead?”

“No child, he’s alive. Loki why don’t you start at the beginning,” his mother interjected. Thor was still shaken. Alive but not king. Odin might have been a terrible father but Thor never thought he’d see a day where he was alive and not near the throne of Asgard. 

“Remember your coronation?” Loki asked.

“How could I forget?”

“Akira was the one who stole from the Vault as part of a plan to create alliances with all the Nine Realms to unite against Thanos.” Loki paused, and looked for his reaction. 

Once upon a time he would have erupted and thrown tantrums at any injustice, perceived as well as real. But he had grown since then and was willing to hear Loki out. It didn't truly matter who invaded the Vault. His past self would have reacted the same way. If he could go back and do it again, he wouldn't change being banished to Midgard. He motioned for Loki to continue.

“We forged an alliance with King Laufey and he in turn forged one with Musphelheim. I never meant for you to be banished” Loki continued. 

“I did. You were a jerk back then,” Akira interjected. Loki glared at her and soon her hair was a bright red. As she gasped, Loki ignored her and continued explaining. 

“I simply wanted to show Odin that you were unfit to be king. You were a great warrior and skilled in politics but all of that was outweighed by your impulsiveness and your temper. I simply wanted him to delay your coronation, not send you off realm without your powers!” Loki’s voice broke off, full of emotion. 

“And I checked up on you, you know. I saw you were safe with Jane. And I came to Midgard when I saw you get captured by SHIELD. I only left once I saw Erik had it under control. And I know this doesn’t absolve me of anything but I had just found out I was a Jotun a few days before your coronation”

Thor’s heart broke a little. Loki had been dealing with his heritage without Thor for months before he knew what was happening. He vaguely remembered a hazy drunken memory where Loki asked him about how he would feel if he wasn’t really his brother and he had mumbled some nonsense about a golden apple. 

“After you were banished, we confronted Odin about my heritage. We had him transfer Hela’s bindings to Asgard itself so she won’t be released when he passes away. We’ve averted Ragnarok by containing her.”

Thor’s eyes widened in shock. That had happened within a few weeks after Loki met Akira. 

Akira continued the explanation. “And then I asked for Loki to act as king using Odin’s face. Not as a power grab or to take the throne away from you, Thor, but to make it easier to prepare the Nine Realms for the upcoming war. We needed someone powerful the Court and the Nine Realms would listen to. Changing the throne from Odin to Loki or even you would have caused instability and weakened negotiations. And we knew Odin would ultimately do what he wanted to, despite the world ending consequences. He could have negotiated peace with the Jotun at any point, but he chose not to and kept their magic away from them. He bound Hela simply because he decided he wanted to change his image from conquering to benevolent. We didn’t want to take the chance that Odin would not follow our plan. After the Odinsleep, we banished Odin to Earth for his role in Ragnarok and for all the suffering he’s caused Loki.” 

Akira’s voice was strained at this point. “In my timeline, Odin let Loki fall off the Bifrost in a battle. He fell through the recesses of space and ended up in Thanos’s thrall and that’s how he ended up mind-controlled and leading the Chitauri invasion.” 

Akira’s hair turned back to black as Loki let out a choked sob and they all moved to comfort Loki. Thor embraced them as his mind reeled from everything he had learned. 

The real Odin was on Midgard. Loki, Akira, and Frigga had collectively acted as Odin for months and had been responsible for the alliances. And most importantly, Odin truly deserved to be banished after what he had done to their family.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I feel like whenever I write Thor he seems ooc. He's a lot more mature after his banishment and staying with mom, Loki, and his Midgardian friends in Asgard for those few months after his banishment. 
> 
> This was the first time that Loki learned how exactly he fell under Thanos' mind control. Akira has been very careful to share only what is necessary from Loki's past life. She does this because she believes in Loki and that under the right circumstances, he would be a hero.


	21. Exposition

Loki’s POV

Loki prepared to leave Asgard once again, mulling over recent events in the little time he had once again. His coming clean to Thor had gone much better than anticipated. There were no flipped tables of food or thunderstorms drenching Asgard despite Thor’s anger. And most surprising of all, most of the anger was directed towards Odin, some towards their mother for not confessing sooner, and none towards Loki. He felt undeserving of Thor’s easy acceptance and forgiveness. Thor had been ridiculously understanding. 

Loki had stopped considering Odin a father after discovering his Jotun heritage. It seemed like Thor had been making that transition as well. That was the only reason Loki could accept that would explain Thor’s empathetic response to banishing a man they had both considered family for centuries. 

As he packed for a longer stay on Midgard, he reflected on everything they had been through on Midgard. They had recovered two infinity stones, captured Thanos’ daughter, and ultimately a mortal man in a metal suit had stopped the conquering of Midgard. It was near miraculous that they had accomplished any of that and emerged unscathed. 

Akira shared that opinion wholeheartedly. As soon as the Odin issue had been resolved she had been ecstatic. She was screaming, “Holy shit, I can’t believe we pulled that off” while running around the palace. It was only after she had made it halfway to the kitchens that Thor found her and directed her in the right direction back to his rooms on the other side of the palace. 

Their position had been precarious during the battle. Without the Jotun army it would have been a very different battle with extensive casualties and damage. In retrospect, it was truly terrifying that they had only been fighting a scout force. The amount of Chitauri that came through the portal was immense but barely scratching the surface of their entire army. They would have been truly fucked if the rest of the Leviathans and troops had come. And to make matters worse, Tony Stark saving the day with the nuke wasn’t as fortuitous as he had originally thought. 

After the shawarma, Loki, Thor, Akira, and Bruce had collapsed from sheer exhaustion on the somehow still intact couches of Tony’s penthouse. Then, Tony had explained the nuke and Loki felt a different type of exhaustion altogether. SHIELD or HYDRA—Who knew at this point, honestly they were both bad in Loki’s opinion—decided that New York was an acceptable loss and that a nuke would stop the invasion. Loki had been livid at that. Not only were these mortals willing to sacrifice their own civilians, they had also deemed the Jotun army expendable. Loki knew how much of the Jotun population remained after the war with Asgard and the Jotun army made up a sizable portion of it. It was a good thing that King Laufey and his army had left when they did or else they and none of the rest of the Nine Realms would ever want to ally themselves with Midgard again. Jotun had come to aid Midgard, seemingly apologetic for invading them centuries ago, and done so without any expectations of compensation. How dare the World Council spurn their generosity and sentence them to death without warning? At that moment, Loki made it a personal priority to dismantle SHIELD and burn HYDRA. 

Another new development he hadn’t had time to consider earlier was Akira’s budding magical abilities. Somehow Akira had managed to hold her own in the Battle of New York with a distorted form of his magic. They had had an hours long discussion about how she was able to do that once they had returned to Asgard. Apparently, she had been crafting magic spells using past Loki’s memories of casting them. Not surprisingly, they weren’t manifesting as expected because magic was all about skill, precision, and practice, none of which Akira had. True she had managed to heal him on the Helicarrier but instead of relieving his pain as she healed the damage, he had felt it all at once. Natasha’s accounts of her spells painted a similar story. It had been inevitable during the invasion but Loki warned her to avoid using magic unless absolutely necessary because it was dangerous to wield it while untrained. 

Thor and Akira entered his chambers, pulling him out of his current line of thought. They were good-naturedly bickering about some Midgardian sweet called a PopTart. Loki felt a pang of sadness watching the interaction. There had been a change in plans and for the first time since they had met, he and Akira were to be separate for an extended amount of time. Akira was originally supposed to return to Midgard to work on eradicating HYDRA with Tony but she had decided it would be a better use of her time to try to convince Nebula to their side. In the past timeline, Tony had somehow managed to befriend the vicious cyborg and Akira was hoping they’d be able to convince her to their side again. 

She had explained that Nebula’s sister, Gamora, would eventually run into the power stone and knew the location of the soul stone. And eventually, the Reality Stone and Time Stone would show up on Midgard. In a moment of uncharacteristic transparency, Akira had summoned Jane Foster and Darcy Lewis and told them how they previously ran into the Aether when the Convergence between the Nine Realms occurred. They had taken it well with Thor vowing to protect Jane no matter what and Darcy enthusiastically agreeing. Luckily, the Convergence was still a few years out. Loki smiled at the memory. He liked Darcy and her sheer brashness, especially after he heard about how she tasered Thor when they first met. 

If Akira had told him how significantly the events of Midgard would shape the end of the world when they first met, he would have laughed in her face and had nothing to do with this whole mess. He had been tasked with helping Tony navigate Midgardian diplomacy in a way that allowed Midgardian heroes to be unified for the inevitable battle against Thanos. Akira had also fully supported his rage against HYDRA. 

As he bid them goodbye and made his way to the Bifrost, Loki dared to be hopeful. Two out of the six infinity stones. They were heading in the right direction and Midgard was key to it all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If somebody has a better title for this please let me know. We've made it past the first Avengers movie guys. Things are heading in the right direction :) 
> 
> Thanks for continuing to read and encourage me. I've been depressed lately but you guys are super supportive and remind me why I originally got into writing. Even if I didn't like my last chapter, you guys did and I'm really glad. It reminded me of why I got into writing for fun. It's restorative and relaxing for me and I shouldn't criticize myself so much about something I do for fun.

**Author's Note:**

> This is a very ambitious project. I will try to update as much as I can. Constructive feedback is always welcomed! Submit fic requests [here](https://forms.gle/MWTRJtGwTQ8j6dWC6)


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